Volgodonsk channel: characteristics and description of the channel

The Volgodonsk navigable canal connects the Don and Volga in a place where they are as close as possible to each other. It is located not far from Volgograd. Volgodonsk channel, photo and description of which you will find in the article, is part of the deep-sea transport system operating in the European part of our country.

The first attempt to connect two rivers

In the middle of the 16th century, the first attempt was made to connect the Don and Volga in the place of their closest rapprochement. In 1569, Selim II, the Turkish sultan, who became famous for his march to Astrakhan, ordered 22,000 soldiers to be sent up the Don. They had to dig a canal connecting two rivers. But a month later the Turks had to retreat. According to the chroniclers, they said that even the whole people here can not do anything and for 100 years. However, the traces of this attempt to connect the two rivers have survived to this day. This is a deep ditch, which is called the Turkish rampart.

The attempt of Peter I

After 130 years, the second attempt to build the Volgodonsk channel was undertaken by Peter I. However, it proved unsuccessful. By the end of 1701 the construction was partially completed, and several locks were completely built. However, in the midst of the work, an order was issued to destroy the canal, as the war with Sweden began. By the way, this project also left a trace - Petrov Val, which is located next to the eponymous city.

The construction of the canal between the Volga and the Don has been moved to another place - the Ivan-Lake district. The Ivanovskaya Canal, built here, connected the Don River with the Tsna River (the Oka tributary) through the Ivan-lake and the Shat River flowing from it. Approximately 300 ships passed it 5 years after the construction began. However, this system turned out to be of low water quality.

Main Projects

More than 30 projects of connecting the Don to the Volga were created before 1917. Most of them were divided into the following three groups:

• Southern, which planned the connection directly to the Azov and Caspian seas or estuaries of the Don and Volga;
• Average, which united the projects of the canal construction in the place of the greatest rapprochement between the Volga and the Don;
• North, which included projects connecting the tributaries of the Don with the tributaries of the Oka.

Hydrologists believe that the northern projects could not be of interest, since they assumed the merging of shallow rivers, which are unsuitable for the passage of modern vessels on them. The southern projects would not have been successful, since the route of the canals would be too stretched in this case, because of which the cost of construction would be very large. Engineers recognized that the most rational projects are the middle group.

However, none of them was realized until the middle of the 20th century. Two circumstances prevented this. First, the railways had private owners who resisted. Secondly, even in the case of the construction of the canal, the movement of ships could be carried out only in the spring, since only then the rivers were deep-watered. About full navigation without their large-scale reconstruction could not be a question. Nevertheless, it is necessary to note the great contribution made by Puzyrevsky Nestor Platonovich, a Russian hydro technician, in the study of the interfluve between the Don and the Volga. He chose a route that would be suitable for the future channel.

According to the GOELRO plan, in 1920 the government of the country again returned to the problem of building a canal. His project, however, was created only in the mid-1930s. The Great Patriotic War prevented its implementation.

Approval of the project

In 1943, after the end of the Battle of Stalingrad, the work resumed. They were led by Sergei Zhuk, experienced hydraulic engineer and builder. Under his leadership by that time, the Moscow-Volga and the White Sea-Baltic canals had already been constructed and built. The scheme of the Volgodonsk complex was approved in February 1948 at a meeting of the Council of Ministers of the Soviet Union. After that, they began to carry out land works.

Who built the channel

It should be noted that the construction of the Volgodonsk channel was carried out by the so-called enemies of the people, that is, political prisoners who were convicted under Article 58 of the Criminal Code in force at the time. Heavy physical work, which convicts were forced to carry out, was counted as a day for two or three imprisonment. However, with the piercing winter cold and the exhausting summer heat, the death rate of people who lived in clay adobe huts and dugouts was very large. The beetle of Sergei Yakovlevich, who directed the construction of the canal, historians of the Hoover Institution is compared with Adolf Eichmann, a Nazi figure who used slave labor.

Term of construction and used equipment

In just 4.5 years, the Volgodonsk canal was built. This is a unique time in the history of the world's hydro construction. For example, the Panama Canal, 81 km long, was built for 34 years with the same amount of work. The 164-kilometer Suez Canal was erected for 11 years.

During construction, 3 million cubic meters ^of concrete were laid and about 150 million m ^{3 of} land was taken out. 8 thousand machines and mechanisms participated in the works: earthmoving shells, multi-bucket and walking excavators, dump trucks, bulldozers, powerful scrapers.

The opening of the canal, its extent and depth

Foreign engineers were skeptical about this grandiose project. They predicted that the spillway dam would not be able to withstand the pressure of water and a grandiose technogenic catastrophe would occur. But Zhuk was confident that everything will be successful. He personally followed the laying of concrete to prevent theft and storming.

May 31, 1952 at 13:55 the waters of the Don and Volga merged between the first and second locks. Since June 1, the ships have already started to move along the canal. July 27, 1952 this building was named after Lenin VI.

The length of the Volgodonsk canal is 101 km. Of these, 45 km pass through reservoirs. The depth of the channel is at least 3.5 m.

Reservoirs and floodgates of the Volgodonsk channel

Vessels for passage from the Volga to the Don should pass 13 locks (the first is shown in the photo above), which are divided into the Don and Volga sluice ladders. The height of the latter is 88 m. It consists of 9 single-cell single-chamber locks. The height of the Don sluice ladder is 44 m. It consists of 4 locks of the same design.

The Volgodonsk Canal connects Don from Kalach-na-Donu with the Volga near Volgograd. It includes Karpovskoe, Bereslavskoe and Varvarovskoe reservoirs. The whole journey takes approximately 10-12 hours. The water coming from the Tsimlyansk reservoir feeds the Volgodonsk Canal, since the Don lies 44 meters above the Volga. Thanks to a system consisting of 3 pumping stations (Varvarovskaya, Marinovskaya and Karpovskaya), water enters the watershed and then flows gravitatively to the Don and Volga slopes. The first and thirteenth locks have triumphal arches. The workers who serve the canal live in the villages created along its route.

Channel Value

Volgodonsk Shipping Canal named after V.I. Lenin joined the following five seas: the Caspian, the Black, the Azov, the White and the Baltic. He linked the ways of the Dnieper, Don, North-Western and Volga basins. The path of this channel lies along arid steppes. He brought moisture to the fields of the Rostov and Volgograd regions.

Main Attractions

Tourists are very impressed with the Volgodonsk channel. Volgograd today is difficult to imagine without this building. Every guest of the city considers it his duty to admire him. Not only fishing on the Volgodonsk canal is popular, there really is something to see.

The beginning of traffic along the canal is from the Sareptsky backwater of the Volga River, which is protected from currents, as well as from the ice drift along the Sarpa River valley. Within the boundaries of Volgograd are the first three locks.

On the Sarpinsky Island (at the entrance to the canal) in 1953 a lighthouse was established, the height of which is 26 meters. On its walls are cast-iron sprouts, they depict the noses of various ancient ships. The author of the project is the architect Yakubov RA.

If you pass along the embankment from the first lock, you will soon see the monument of Lenin (pictured above). When the canal was opened, another monument was erected - I.V. Stalin, who is on a high pedestal. This monument was erected as soon as possible. Native copper went to casting the figure of the national leader. The monument (photo below) was on the site for several years, 40 meters higher than the level of the Volga. However, as a result of the de-Stalinization process, which was started in 1961 at the XX Congress, this monument was removed. From it there was only a reinforced concrete pedestal, which passes into the pile monolithic foundation of the embankment.

It was decided to install a new monument on the pedestal, now VI. To Lenin. It is made of monolithic reinforced concrete. The height of the sculpture is 27 m, and the pedestal - 30 m. Architect Delin VA. And sculptor Vuchetich EV Are the authors of the monument. It is interesting that the monument to Lenin entered the Guinness Book of Records. It is the largest monument in the world, established in honor of a real person.

The Volgodonsk channel today

More than 19,000 ships pass through the waterworks 60 years later. At present, there is a question of constructing another thread of the Volgodonsk channel, thanks to which it would be possible to increase its cargo flows. Perhaps, its erection will take place in the coming years, although due to the crisis this issue, apparently, will have to be postponed for a while. However, the president plans to expand the Volgodonsk channel, building another thread, which he reported back in 2007. The construction of the second branch is expected to double the capacity of the channel - up to 30-35 million tons of cargo per year. However, at the present time the active thread of Volgodon is only half loaded.