Table of contents:
- Radar "Duga"
- Submarine base in Balaklava
- Accelerator storage complex "Proton"
- Oil stones
- Semipalatinsk test site
Video: USSR superprojects: grandiose and abandoned
2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55
These objects were classified during the Soviet Union, and the population learned about them only after the USSR was gone: funding ceased, priorities changed, access to places was opened where it was impossible to get there without a call from above.
These are real colossus: polygons, cities in the middle of the sea, and even their own collider. We will introduce you to some of them.
Radar "Duga"
"Duga" is a radar station for early warning of intercontinental missile strikes. In the entire Union there were only 3 such stations (Pripyat, Komsomolsk-on-Amur and Nikolaev), they provided the ability to detect targets at a distance of up to 3 thousand km. With the help of the "Duga", the military could literally look beyond the horizon and detect the launch of missiles while still in the United States.
For a long time, this object was shrouded in legends: there were rumors that this was a center for the study of psychotronic weapons. There was something to be afraid of - when the system was launched, it blocked the possibility of using the shortwave range throughout the world. It is believed that the station has been completely dismantled, but who knows?
Submarine base in Balaklava
This structure in Mount Tavros can shelter 7 nuclear submarines and is capable of withstanding a direct hit from a 100 kiloton atomic bomb. During a nuclear threat, 3,000 people could have sheltered at the base, and its total area reached 10,000 square meters. m.
The base was strictly classified in Soviet times: when it was built, the soil was taken out exclusively at night and dumped into the open sea. Everyone who worked in the construction signed a nondisclosure document. The facility was closed in 1993 and was not guarded, which is why it was looted by looters. Today in the Russian Federation they are discussing the possibility of restoring the base.
Accelerator storage complex "Proton"
"Proton" is the unfinished construction of a research institute in Protvino, which assumed the creation of a domestic collider back in 1983. Its main ring is 21 kilometers long, and the tunnel itself, in which the protons were going to collide, is located at a depth of 20 to 60 meters. The diameter of the tunnel is impressive - 5 meters.
Construction was frozen in 1994 due to lack of funds. Today the collider remains in a mothballed state, the required temperature is maintained there, ventilation and lighting are working. If access to the LHC near Geneva is closed, the Russians will have to finish building this one.
Oil stones
This is the name of an urban-type settlement in the east of Azerbaijan, located in the Caspian Sea. It is built on metal piles, erected back in 1949, when the Soviet government was massively developing offshore oil wells. The town is completely autonomous, it has all the vital infrastructure.
About 2 thousand people still live there, but due to low profitability, half of the wells were closed long ago. Nevertheless, the Oil Rocks are not abandoned, like many other cities on the water. By the way, the length of the streets of the village along the sea is 350 kilometers!
Semipalatinsk test site
This largest nuclear test site in the entire USSR is located in Kazakhstan. The most modern nuclear weapons were stored and serviced here. The first explosion was made back in 1949, the equivalent of TNT was 30 kilotons. Since then, 473 charges have been tested at the test site, 354 of them underground.
From 1996 to 2012, during the joint operation of Kazakhstan, Russia and the United States, about 200 kg of plutonium was buried at the test site, which remained after the tests. This gigantic object is not guarded in any way, people live on its territory and cattle graze peacefully …
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