The classified tragedy of the Kuriles, or How one Soviet seaside town disappeared in a matter of minutes

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

On the morning of November 5, 1952, an earthquake at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean caused a multi-meter wave that completely destroyed Severo-Kurilsk. According to generally accepted statistics, the tsunami killed over 2,300 residents of a small seaside town. The real number of victims is still unknown today, and people are reluctant to remember the tragedy.

Life on a volcano and geographic features

Residents of Severo-Kurilsk can safely claim that they live like on a volcano. There are 5 active volcanoes on the island of Paramushir, and there are 23 of them in total. Periodically located 7 kilometers from the settlements, Ebeko reminds of itself, releasing generous volcanic gases. Under certain weather conditions, hydrogen sulfide with chlorine reaches the borders of Severo-Kurilsk, and then Sakhalin meteorologists persistently warn about air pollution. The gases emitted are toxic enough to be poisoned.

After one such episode in 1859, massive poisoning among local residents and even cases of death of livestock and pets were recorded on Paramushir. At the same time, the site for the construction of the port of Severo-Kurilsk in the post-war 50s was chosen without a corresponding volcanological examination. Only the sufficient level of the settlement above sea level (at least 30 meters) was taken into account. But the tragedy came not with fire, but with water.

The earthquake that triggered one of the largest tsunamis of the 20th century

The trouble overtook Severo-Kurilsk on a November night in 1952, when the townspeople and inhabitants of nearby fishing villages were fast asleep. Powerful tremors of magnitude, according to various information, 8-9 points were concentrated in the Pacific Ocean, hundreds of kilometers from the coast of Kamchatka. The earthquake caused a triple tsunami, which will later be named after the city washed off the face of the earth. At first, the townspeople were awakened by distinctly palpable tremors that lasted only a couple of minutes. But despite the apparent earthquake, no one began to panic, since such phenomena are not rare in the Kuril Islands. The tremors subsided, and everyone calmed down, continuing to sleep. A little over half an hour passed, and Severo-Kurilsk was covered with an icy ten-meter wave. There were three waves in total, the second of which turned out to be the most destructive, reaching, according to various sources, from 12 to 18 meters in height.

How smokers mistook the tsunami for war

At that time, the accounting work among the population of Severo-Kurilsk was not clearly established. Permanently resident, seasonal migrant workers, secret military units with an undisclosed numerical strength. According to official information, in 1952 up to 6 thousand people lived in Severo-Kurilsk alone. In 1951, young Konstantin Ponedelnikov and his friends went to the Kuril Islands for a part-time job. They were engaged in the construction of houses, plastering walls, helped with the arrangement of the interior of the local fish factory. According to his stories, there were many visitors in the Far East at that time. On that unfortunate day, Konstantin returned from the street late, closer to 3 o'clock in the morning.

Getting ready for bed, I immediately felt that the house was shaking. An experienced local neighbor advised me to get dressed and go out quickly. Konstantin listened and ran out of the rented room. The ground on the street literally disappeared from underfoot, and from the side of the coast, shots and frightened voices were heard. People fled from there, shouting "War!"At least that's exactly what Constantine initially thought. But in fact, the fishermen were in a hurry to warn the townspeople about the impending tsunami, shouting loudly: "Wave" ". The locals hurrying to save themselves rushed up to the hills, where the border guard was located. And Konstantin ran along with the others. Everyone knew that there were army dugouts on the hill, where military exercises were held. There the townspeople planned to take refuge on a cold November night.

These dugouts later became the shelter of the surviving people for the next few days. When the first tsunami wave that covered Severo-Kurilsk departed, the survivors descended, trying to find the missing loved ones and release the cattle. Few people realized that a tsunami has a huge wavelength, and an impressive time can pass before the next one approaches. And so it happened. The height of the second and most powerful wave, according to the most daring estimates, reached 18 meters. It was she who turned out to be the most destructive. The third took with her everything that had been destroyed by the previous ones. The strait washing Paramushir was filled with floating debris of walls and roofs of houses. According to official information, over 2,300 people died in Severo-Kurilsk alone.

Demolished settlements and unspecified casualties

After this tragedy, only a monument to the Hero of the USSR pilot Talalikhin, a stadium gate and a few buildings located on a hill far from the coast survived in the city. The city was wiped off the face of the earth, and along with it several small villages on Paramushir and Shumshu with a population of no more than 10 thousand inhabitants disappeared completely. The number of deaths in suburban settlements is not known for certain, since most of their inhabitants were classified military personnel. Decades later, local historians tried to restore the events and, according to the results of painstaking work, it was established that at least 8,000 people were victims of the tsunami.

After the complete elimination of the consequences of the disaster, many of the disappeared villages have not been restored. For this reason, by the mid-50s, the population on the islands had declined significantly. They decided to rebuild the port city of Severo-Kurilsk in a different place. At the same time, according to experts, the necessary examinations were again neglected. And as a result, the city again found itself in an unsafe position - in the path of the potential movement of mud streams of the active Ebeko, one of the most active volcanoes in the Kuril Islands. The sad events of 1952 became key for the government's decree on the formation of a service to warn about the impending tsunami. In 1956, the Presidium of the USSR Academy of Sciences assigned the corresponding tasks to the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk seismic station. Later, several more joined her.

And in these places of the USSR were the most dangerous to live.