The most dangerous and secret objects of the USSR

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

After the collapse of the USSR, the most dangerous and secret facilities were blown up, mothballed and evacuated, while many others were simply abandoned. They were left to rust: after all, the economies of most newly-made states simply could not afford their maintenance, they turned out to be of no use to anyone.

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Secret complex on the Aral Sea

During the Soviet era, on an island in the middle of the Aral Sea, a complex of military bioengineering institutes was located, engaged in the development and testing of biological weapons. It was an object of such a degree of secrecy that most of the employees who were involved in the landfill's maintenance infrastructure simply did not know exactly where they were working.

On the island itself there were buildings and laboratories of the institute, vivariums, equipment warehouses. In the town, very comfortable conditions for living in conditions of complete autonomy were created for the researchers and the military. The island was carefully guarded by the military on land and at sea.

In 1992, the entire facility was urgently mothballed and abandoned by all residents, including the security of the facility. For some time it remained a "ghost town" until it was scouted by marauders who, for over 20 years, removed everything that was thrown there from the island.

The fate of the secret developments on the island and their results - cultures of deadly microorganisms - is still a mystery.

Heavy-duty "Russian woodpecker"

"Over-the-horizon" radar station Duga is a radar station created in the USSR for the early detection of ICBM launches by starting flashes (based on the reflection of radiation by the ionosphere).

This gigantic structure took 5 years to build and was completed in 1985. The Cyclopean antenna, 150 meters high and 800 meters long, consumed a huge amount of electricity, so it was built near the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.

For the characteristic sound on the air, emitted during operation (knock), the station was named Russian Woodpecker (Russian Woodpecker). The installation was built for centuries and could have successfully operated to this day, but in reality the Duga radar has worked for less than a year. The facility stopped working after the explosion of the Chernobyl nuclear power plant.

Rocket complex "Dvina"

Not far from the capital of Latvia in the forest are the remains of the Dvina missile system. Built in 1964, the facility consisted of 4 launch shafts about 35 meters deep and underground bunkers.

Much of the premises are currently flooded, and visiting the launcher without an experienced stalker guide is not recommended. Also dangerous are the remains of the poisonous rocket fuel - heptyl, according to some reports, remaining in the bowels of the launch silos.

Exactly the same mines were located in Transcarpathia, in the districts of the cities of Stryi and Brody, near Kostroma, near Kozelsk and in other regions of the country.

"Well to hell" or Kola superdeep well

The Kola superdeep well is 12,262 meters long. It is located in the Murmansk region, 10 kilometers west of the city of Zapolyarny.

The well was drilled in the northeastern part of the Baltic Shield exclusively for research purposes in the place where the lower boundary of the earth's crust comes close to the Earth's surface.

In the best years, 16 research laboratories worked at the Kola superdeep well, they were personally supervised by the Minister of Geology of the USSR.

Many interesting discoveries were made at the well, for example, the fact that life on Earth arose, it turns out, 1.5 billion years earlier than expected. At depths where it was believed that there is not and cannot be organic matter, 14 species of fossilized microorganisms were found - the age of the deep layers exceeded 2.8 billion years.

In 2008, the facility was abandoned, the equipment was dismantled, and the destruction of the building began. As of 2010, the well was mothballed and is gradually being destroyed. The restoration cost is several hundred million rubles.

The Kola superdeep well is associated with many implausible legends about a "well to hell" from the bottom of which the cries of sinners are heard, and the hell flame melts the drill bits.

"Oil Rocks" - the sea city of oil producers in the Caspian

This settlement on overpasses, standing right in the Caspian Sea, is listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's oldest oil platforms. It was built in 1949 in connection with the start of oil production from the seabed around the Black Rocks - a stone ridge that barely protrudes from the sea surface.

There are drilling rigs connected by racks, on which the village of workers of oil fields is located. The village grew, and during its heyday it included power plants, nine-story dormitory buildings, hospitals, a cultural center, a park with trees, a bakery, a lemonade workshop and even a mosque with a full-time mullah.

The length of the flyover streets and lanes of the sea city reaches 350 kilometers. There was no permanent population in the city, and up to 2,000 people lived there as part of the shift shift.

The period of decline of Oil Rocks began with the emergence of cheaper Siberian oil, which made offshore production unprofitable. However, the seaside town still did not become a ghost town; in the early 2000s, major repairs began there and even began laying new wells.

The failed Soviet collider

Near the town of Protvino, Moscow Region, there is a giant unfinished and now abandoned particle accelerator.

In Soviet times, the Protvino scientific center near Moscow was a city of nuclear physicists, a powerful complex of physics institutes, where scientists from all over the world came. A 21-kilometer-long ring tunnel was built at a depth of 60 meters. He is now located near Protvino.

They even began to bring new equipment into the already finished accelerator tunnel, but then a series of political upheavals of the nineties burst out, and the domestic “hadron collider” remained empty, not assembled.

The institutes of the city of Protvino somehow maintain the satisfactory condition of this tunnel - an empty dark ring under the ground. There is a lighting system, there is an operating narrow-gauge line.

All sorts of commercial projects have been proposed, such as an underground amusement park or even a mushroom farm. However, scientists are not yet giving this object to "businessmen" - they hope for the best.

Submarine underwater shelter

According to knowledgeable people, this top-secret submarine base, codenamed Object 221, in Balaklava was a transit point where submarines, including nuclear ones, were repaired, refueled and replenished with ammunition.

It was a gigantic complex built to last for centuries, capable of withstanding a nuclear strike; under its arches, up to 14 submarines could simultaneously be accommodated. This military base was built in 1961 and abandoned in 1993, after which it was disassembled by local residents.

In 2002, it was decided to build a museum complex on the ruins of the base, but so far nothing has gone beyond words. However, local diggers willingly take everyone there.