A successful search and rescue operation took place off the east coast of Japan, where a fishing boat was wrecked.

The incident occurred in the Pacific Ocean and almost cost the lives of 18 crew members of the ship in distress.

The crew of the wreck was reportedly rescued by a fishing schooner passing by. Also, part of the crew managed to leave the ship on a lifeboat, after which they were picked up by another vessel.

At the moment, nothing threatens the life and health of sailors. In total, 18 crew members were rescued - 12 citizens of Japan and 6 natives of Indonesia.

The first reports of the sinking of a fishing vessel 850 kilometers off the coast of the Japanese prefecture of Miyagi were received on the night of June 19-20. At the moment, the causes and circumstances of the shipwreck are not known.

In all likelihood, the ship received a hole, as the colleagues rescuing the sailors noticed that the ship was listing to the port side.

The incident took place in storm conditions. A strong storm was observed in the region of the shipwreck and waves up to 4 meters were recorded. Two ships of the Japanese Coast Guard and three helicopters were sent to the sinking ship, the crews of which did not have time to help the sinking ship.

On Monday, July 2, at the Zaporozhye resort, vacationers filmed a tornado that was seen in the Sea of Azov, at a great distance from the coast.

The activist of "Helper Zaporozhye" Evgeny Pavlyuk managed to film the disaster.

It is worth noting that a natural phenomenon was recorded in the resort village of Kirillovka.

In particular, the tornado was noticed in the Sea of Azov around 9:30.

Nearly 200 people missing in shipwreck

A large-scale disaster on the water occurred in Indonesia, where 166 people were missing as a result of the collapse of the ferry. This was stated by official representatives of the government of Indonesia.

Note that earlier there was information about 130 potential victims of the crash.

Recall that the ferry with several hundred passengers sank on Lake Toba in the Indonesian province of North Sumatra yesterday, June 19. In total, there were more than 350 people on board the sunken ship.

At the moment, only one person is known to have died, as the bodies of the other passengers from the ferry have not been found. Hundreds of rescue workers and volunteers are working at the scene of the tragedy. Work to search for potential victims of the crash is complicated by bad weather conditions.

At the moment, information about the probable cause of the ship's disaster has not been received.

Residents of South Korea on Sunday, July 1, suffered from the most powerful heavy rains, which were caused by the approach of a typhoon called Prapirun to the southwestern coast of the country. About a natural disaster The Korea Herald.

According to the publication, due to the complication of weather conditions, at least one person was previously missing, another one died.

In total, about 33 flights at eight airports across the state had to be canceled. Heavy rains caused flooding in many parts of the country.

Ship wreck in Indonesia: rescuers can't find about 60 passengers

On Monday, June 18, a ferry with about 80 passengers on board sank in Indonesia, one person died, dozens are missing.

The Sinar Bangun ferry, which was carrying passengers in the province of North Sumatra on Lake Toba, sank in stormy weather around 17:30 local time (13:30 Kyiv time) a mile from the port of Tigaras.

In the first hours of the search and rescue operation, about 19 people were lifted out of the water. In addition, the body of one tourist was found. All others are listed as "missing".

Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, spokesman for the National Disaster Management Authority, said the rescue operation is ongoing at the lake, but bad weather is slowing it down.

It is reported that Lake Toba, where the accident occurred, is located in the mouth of an extinct volcano. The lake is considered the world's largest reservoir of volcanic origin. Its dimensions reach 87 kilometers in length and 27 kilometers in width.

Heavy rains in South Korea: 1 dead, 8 injured.

South Korea has been hit by heavy rains that have led to floods. In different regions of the country, 66 houses, 4528 hectares of agricultural land were damaged or flooded, 22 cars were under water. One person died as a result of a lightning strike. During the floods, 8 people were injured, according to KBS World Radio.

Boat exploded in the Bahamas

A ship full of tourists exploded in the Bahamas. As a result of the explosion, one person died on the spot and 11 others received injuries of varying severity.

According to CNN, the ship's engine exploded during a tourist flight. The boat with passengers was immediately engulfed in flames.

The coast guard arrived at the scene of the accident.

In total, there were ten passengers and two crew members on board - residents of the islands.

The Coast Guard said four U.S. tourists were taken to a Florida hospital, while the rest were sent to the Princess Margaret Hospital in Nassau, the capital of the Bahamas.

The captain of the ship, who needs medical attention, is also among the injured.

There was a video of the boat, on which during the explosion there were 10 tourists

In the Bahamas, tourists witnessed a terrifying sight: a boat with people on board caught fire before their eyes. This was due to an engine explosion, after which the ship instantly engulfed in flames. Witnesses of the tragedy were able to swim closer to help the tourists who were there.

According to the New York Post, there were 10 American tourists and two residents of the Bahamas on the boat. One person died, and everyone else received serious injuries and burns. They were rescued and taken to the hospital.

Floods kill 5 in Ghana

Flash floods last Thursday in the city of Kumasi in Ghana killed at least five people and left one more missing, the agency said. G.N.A.

The emergency response team rescued 293 people from flood waters. The search for the missing teenage girl continues.

The flash flood was caused by heavy rain that lasted for six hours. Some buildings were damaged.

The shipwreck claimed the lives of hundreds of people, including babies

The crash of a ship in the Mediterranean could take the lives of about 100 illegal migrants. Among the possible victims of the shipwreck are two babies and three children under 12 years old.

It is reported that the crash of a ship with refugees occurred the day before near the coast of Libya.

The bodies of three children have been found and about a hundred more are missing after a boat carrying migrants sank off the coast of Libya on Friday., officials said.

About 120 people were on board the sunken ship, of which only 16 were rescued. It is assumed that another 100 people died in the waters of the Mediterranean Sea.

Passengers who survived the crash said the ship sank as a result of the explosion. On board were citizens of Morocco and Yemen.

At the moment, in the area of the shipwreck, search operation. The chances of finding surviving passengers are minimal.

Typhoon Prapirun passes Okinawa, warnings issued on the Japanese island of Kyushu and South Korea

Typhoon "Prapirun" ("Florita" - according to the Philippine classification) passed Japanese island Okinawa, where there were no serious consequences, and continues to move in the East China Sea, shifting to the island of Kyushu. Wind speed reaches 125 km / h, gusts - 180 km / h, informs the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA). In South Korea, strong wind warnings and in large numbers precipitation is affecting Jeju Island and the southern regions of the country, the Korean Meteorological Administration (KMA) warns.

The cargo ship crashed into the moored ships and sank them

Dry cargo ship "BAO KHANH 16" (IMO 8603236, flag of Vietnam) rammed ships that were moored.

In total, experts counted that a large ship collided with three small ones.

So, the ship "NB-6589" as a result of the impact still managed to stay afloat. The vessel only recorded minor damage to the hull.

Two more ships from a strong blow went to the bottom and completely sank. It is reported that one of them tried to reach the shore, and the second sank at the scene of the accident.

The preliminary cause of the collision of such a number of ships was an accident.

Storms hit the US

Several storms swept through the United States from the Mississippi Valley to the Gulf Coast, leaving a vast trail of destruction along the way. The storms were fueled by the intense heat and humidity that continues to build up over the eastern half of the country.

Most of the damage was caused by the wind. A tornado was confirmed in Hickman, Tennessee as winds reached 180 km/h. Wind gusts up to 60 mph were common from eastern Missouri and southwestern Illinois to western Tennessee and much of Alabama. Strong winds easily knocked down trees and power lines, leaving more than 200,000 people without power at the height of the storms.

200,000 residents were left without power in Alabama alone. In Huntsville, also in Alabama, a 70-year-old woman was struck by lightning during bad weather and is in critical condition. New storms on June 30 may interfere with restoration work in the southeast of the country. However, the severity and destructive power of the events that have just taken place are not expected to be repeated.

US Navy destroyer comes to the aid of Filipino fishermen in distress

The crew of the U.S. Arleigh Burke-class missile destroyer Mustin came to the aid of two Filipino fishermen whose boat engine failed. This was reported on Thursday, June 28, by the portal Korabli.eu with reference to the press service of the US Navy Department of Defense.

The crew of the destroyer immediately came to the aid of the Filipinos in distress. First, the sailors contacted the nearest other fishing vessel and reported what had happened. After that, a boat was lowered into the water, which towed the emergency boat to other fishing vessels. Also, the victims were provided with food with a supply for three days.

After making sure that everything was in order with the fishermen, the destroyer Mustin continued patrolling.

"Mustin" is part of the strike group of the aircraft carrier "Ronald Reagan".

AT Krasnodar Territory hail caused the death of a local resident

Timashevsky, Bryukhovetsky, Korenovsky and Pavlovsky districts suffered from hail Krasnodar Territory. The biggest damage was done to the Timashevsky district, where 1,800 houses were damaged in the village of Novokorsunskaya, the district administration reports. In the Bryukhovetsky district, 1,438 households in the village of Baturinskaya and the farm of Zarya were in the emergency zone. Restoration work lasted a little over a day.

At present, the consequences of the disaster have been practically eliminated, the district administration notes. In the village of Baturinskaya, during the elements, a canopy collapsed, as a result of which a local resident died. On this fact, the Timashevsk Interdistrict Investigation Department of the TFR in the region organized a pre-investigation check, reports the Investigative Committee of the RF Investigative Committee for the Krasnodar Territory.

Also, squalls and heavy downpours with hail took place almost throughout the territory of Ukraine and in the Crimea. Many settlements were flooded and de-energized, causing damage to agriculture.

It would seem that what can happen on the world's smallest, warm and calm Sea of Azov? Alas, tragedy recent years, including the current bathing season, confirm that the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov, despite the external calm and grace, is fraught with a lot of mysteries and dangers.

Last year we talked about the tragedy that happened on the other side of the Azov coast, on the island of the Yeisk Spit. On the morning of July 7, 74 children and teenagers from the pioneer camp arrived on an excursion to the island. During the group's stay, children were allowed to swim near the shore. But because of the strong current, six children could not go ashore and drowned along with the teacher who tried to save them. To date, all the bodies of the dead have been identified - the teacher, three boys, aged 8, 9 and 11, and three girls aged 12, 16 and 9.

In the summer of the year before last, in the village of Yurievka, located fifty kilometers from Mariupol, a tragic incident also occurred. At a depth of only about a meter, twenty meters from the shore, a twelve-year-old boy almost drowned. Two adult, physically strong thirty-year-old guys who came to his aid were able to push the boy out of the water, but they themselves became victims of the deep sea.

It was nine o'clock in the morning, the adults were sober, relaxing on the beach with their families. How such a tragedy could happen is incomprehensible. The surviving boy says that he was playing with his uncle in the sea with a ball and suddenly the sand began to suddenly disappear from under his feet. He began to shout, his uncle rushed to the rescue, who walked away at that time for the ball that had flown off to the side. Uncle arrived in time, pushed the boy aground, but he began to sink. Seeing such a picture, another man rushed to the rescue. They and the rescuers who came to the rescue pulled the boy out of the water, but unknown naval forces dragged two adult men under the water.

What is the cause of these tragedies? Are they rare? Let's try to deal with these issues in order.

One of the most obvious causes of tragedies is sea currents and the whirlpools they cause. Yuryevka is located between two spits Belosaraiskaya and Berdyanskaya. When two currents meet in the Yalta Bay, a swirl of sea water is formed, which often leads to whirlpools. Fishermen say that sometimes the boats turn so that it is difficult to pull out. The locals do not remember the cases when the boats sank due to the whirlpool, in the worst case they were carried to the sea. That is, there is no need to talk about some huge whirlpools in Azov.

According to Andrei Kiyanenko, head of the recreation department of the Meotida Regional Landscape Park, currents and whirlpools are strong not only in the Yuryevka area, but especially at the ends of the Azov spits - on Belosaraiskaya, Berdyanskaya, Dolgaya, Sedov Spit, Yeisk Spit and others, unique in their its formation of the Azov braids. Tragic cases when people were carried away to the sea not only for air mattresses, but without them happened before. Drowning on the scythes, even fully prepared for big water athletes.

So, exactly twenty years ago from the day of the tragedy in Yuryevka, on July 15, 1989, the crews of 9 ships of the city Young Sailors Club went to sea from Mariupol. After a twelve-day voyage, the Orion training ship, 2 motorboats and 4 boats returned, and two ships with seven adult crew members and five cadets had to sail further to circle the Sea of Azov with a call at Yeysk, Kerch and Berdyansk. At noon on July 28, the executive committee of the Mariupol City Council received the first alarming information: the ships were at the Dolgaya Spit, the crews were missing. Created without delay emergency commission city executive committee. Vessels of the Azov Sea and Volga-Don River Shipping Companies, located in the waters of the sea, rescue vessels of the emergency rescue service of the Black Sea Fleet, rescue equipment of fishing collective farms of the Krasnodar Territory, military aircraft and helicopters, aviation of the traffic police of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Donetsk region were involved in the search for the missing.

On the evening of July 31, military pilots reported from Rostov-on-Don: in the area of the village of Kamyshevatskaya, not far from Yeysk and the Dolgaya Spit, bodies were found washed ashore by waves. Soon - a new message: 5 more bodies were found. And only in the second half next day the tenth dead crew member was found. The surviving two passengers of the yacht - a boy of eight and a seventeen-year-old girl - did not clarify the course of events. When asked where the others were, they said they were asleep and saw nothing. At the dawn of perestroika, this mysterious case was discussed in the press for a long time and did not leave the lips of ordinary people. The culprit for the death of an entire team was considered by some to be UFOs, others as poachers, whose illegal fishing was allegedly witnessed by young sailors.

We will not comment on the first assumption ... The other is unlikely. If the poachers so easily destroyed ten young lads, then in those days they would have been found and simply drowned somewhere nearby. It is unlikely that anyone would have raised their hand to carry out such a blatant atrocity. It remains to look for the cause of a terrible riddle in the sea.

As the two survivors later said, they woke up at the same time in the middle of the night with a feeling of inexplicable anxiety. The sailors' clothes were scattered randomly on the deck. The depth in that place was negligible - the yacht was sitting aground, where the bottom is visible from any side. The yachtsmen with whom we spoke believe that the reason for the death of the guys could be strong sea currents running along the tip of the Dolgaya Spit, caused by a surge wave. Most likely, the guys climbed into the water to push the boat aground, fell into the current, the rest rushed to save them and were also carried into the sea one by one.

I would not like to turn to mysticism, but in all these accidents there are still several fatal coincidences and magical numbers. The boat, which, perhaps indirectly, caused the death of the crew in 1989, at that time it was called Arktos, after exactly 13 (!) Years, and, more incredibly, again on July 25, converted by this time into a yacht with a new name "Mariupol" drowned five passengers and sank herself. In the area of the village of Melekino, she rolled vacationers. Despite the fact that it was designed for only 10 people, the captain took 38 passengers on board. From a small wave, one and a half kilometers from the shore, the yacht capsized. The ship rolled over on its side and slowly began to sink. Of the 38 passengers, 33 were rescued. Interestingly, after the tragedy, the yacht was lifted from the bottom by a floating crane of the Mariupol port, was stored in the port for about a year, and then taken out in an unknown direction, its further fate is unknown to us. Will it be restored and launched again? It is quite possible, although the yachtsmen with whom we spoke believe that such an unfortunate yacht still needs to be looked for and it would be best to simply destroy it, burn it, and scatter the ashes over the sea. But back to our main question.

Spit Dolgaya, if anyone does not know, is located on the opposite coast of the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov, on the territory Russian Federation. In the Soviet years, when there were no borders between our countries, Mariupol yachtsmen often sailed on the other side of the sea. If you look at the map of the Sea of Azov, it is noticeable that the Dolgaya Spit is located almost directly opposite the Belosaraiskaya Spit. Thus, the flow of the water mass in this place passes as through the neck of a bottle and, accordingly, increases. With a surge wave caused by the western and southwestern winds, the sea level in the area of the Taganrog Bay sometimes rises to two meters. When the winds weaken, the water rushes back, and in a rather swift stream.

A friend of the author of these lines has recently personally seen how dangerous the ends of the Azov spits can be - he saved a girl of about twelve years old at the tip of Belosaraika. While her parents were enthusiastically chatting on the shore, she ran aground about fifty meters from the shore, you can’t say otherwise - into the open sea, because at the tip of the spit the sea is almost from all sides. The depth for her growth was slightly above the waist, but at the same time she could not get out of the sea on her own. She managed to hit just at the junction of two currents, this was clearly indicated by the waves rolling on each other from different sides at an angle of about fifty degrees.

“At the beginning, she did not understand that things were wrong and calmly jumped on the waves, but then horror appeared on her face,” said a friend. — She tried to walk to the shore, and the sea dragged her back. Surely, in such an unequal struggle, her strength would have been enough for a short time, especially since physically the girl was clearly not an athlete. When I approached it, despite the relatively calm surface of the water, I felt a mighty river flowing along the bottom. The current was so strong that I could hardly stand on my feet. I was scared out of my mind. I told the girl to hold on to my hand, and so, step by step, we gradually got out into shallow water, and then onto the shore. If it were a little deeper, I would not have overcome the current ... ".

Such a force lives in the "gentle" Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov. The author of these lines, as an admirer of rest on the Belosarayskaya Spit, himself repeatedly tested the strength of this current. At the very end of the spit it is better not to swim at all, but before reaching its last point you can. The main thing is to stay no more than ten to fifteen meters from the shore at all times, and that the depth should not be above the waist. You can get interesting sensations. You just need to relax, lie on your back, and the current itself will carry you along the shore at about the speed of a person walking at a fast pace, - verified. Although such a strong current is not always the case. Such is the river in the sea - exotic! But this exotic would be good if it had not ruined so many people.

According to Andrei Kiyanenko, there are fewer cases of drowned people on spits than in other places only because the number of vacationers on them is much smaller. And on the spit of Sedov guards landscape park"Meotida" in general, vacationers are not allowed to go to the tip of the spit, they guard nesting birds. Things are worse on the Belosarskaya Spit. Every year more and more vacationers come here, to the tip of the spit, and many of them are not even aware of the danger that this is fraught with. beautiful place.

But the tragedy that occurred in Yuryevka last year cannot be unambiguously blamed on sea currents. Firstly, near the shore at shallow depths, they are not strong enough to drag and drown two young physically strong men who can swim. Secondly, Yuryevka is located practically in the Yalta Bay and the currents here are extremely weak. For some reason, no such cases were noted in the neighboring villages of Yalta and Urzuf. Moreover, they were not there, not according to official data, but according to local residents, including Meotida employees. Most dangerous place, according to the Yuryevites, is located on the outskirts of Yuryevka, from the side of Urzuf, in an area with a self-explanatory name - Cape Serpentine.

He does not believe that the cause of the tragedy in Yuryevka was the currents and the head of the Mariupol public environmental organization "Clean Coast", a sailor and yachtsman Yulian Mikhailov.

“There is a muddy bottom there, almost a swamp, what strong currents can there be? - He asks a question. - I have been involved in yachting for many years, I know the sea like a native and, believe me, I have not seen even in the open sea, not to mention the Yalta Bay, funnels that can drag an adult who can swim a man under water. In sea directions (reference books for sailors) there is also no mention of strong currents in this area. I can only guess about the causes of natural anomalies in Yuryevka, but sea currents are not to blame for them.

Olga Shakula, head of the department of nature of the Mariupol Museum of Local Lore, agrees with the opinion of the yachtsman-ecologist. According to her, the reason lies rather in the fact that just in the area of \u200b\u200bCape Zmeinny there is a global geological fault between bedrock slabs at a depth of about one kilometer. It crosses the entire Sea of Azov and creates seismic activity in Crimea. In the course of geological movements, the plates overlap each other, crumble, and shift the upper soil layers. By the way, the release of fragments of these rocks appears on the surface in the ill-fated, widely known radioactive "black" sands, which are based on radioactive thorium. In addition to the outcropping of sands, the geological instability of the area also contributes to massive movements of the upper part of the earth's surface, including leads to mudflows and landslides, which occur not only on land, but also under the layer of sea water.

According to Olga Shakula, it is possible that the cause of the tragedies in Yuryevka was precisely these features of the change in the state of the soil. Mudflows are a low-density solid mass composed of silt, clay and sand. This mass cannot support the weight of a person. Soil activity, faults and cracks also contribute to the formation of underground rivers. Where these waters wash out the bottom surface, dips form. Locals say that during the construction of one of the buildings of the boarding house in Yuryevka, during the driving of the first pile, it simply fell somewhere deep underground and the idea with piles had to be abandoned.

“Five years ago we rested in Yuryevka with the families and employees of our museum,” says Olga Shakula. “Our colleague almost drowned at a shallow depth, before our eyes she began to fall into the sand, screamed, we understood from her face that she was not joking, my husband would not have had time to swim, and therefore threw her a children's inflatable ring. Everything happened in a matter of seconds, a colleague still believes that the circle thrown by her husband saved her life.

There is also another phenomenon in Yuryevka - the release of gas to the surface. Locals say that in winter, when the sea is covered with a crust of thin clear ice accumulations of gas bubbles under the ice are very clearly visible. Children even have entertainment - to drill a small hole in the ice and set fire to the gas that comes out of it.

According to Georgy Ryazantsev, an employee of the Azov Research Station, the cause of death is methane emissions from silt deposits.

“Under the sand, under the shells, under the clayey rocks, the formation of cavities in which the gas is located is possible, and when these cavities are overfilled, the gas can escape right here,” says the researcher.

Thus, at the time of the release of gas, a person finds himself in a rarefied gas, the density of which does not allow a person to remain on the surface. He instantly falls into the abyss and dies in a split second.

Experts note that no extensive scientific research on the impact of the geological fault on the ecology of the Sea of Azov in its northern part has been carried out. The seashore is full of unsolved mysteries. Unfortunately, some of these mysteries lead to terrible consequences, and therefore, in our opinion, deserve closer, detailed scientific study. According to experts, in order to accurately determine the causes of the tragedies and develop a set of security measures, it is necessary to carry out drilling operations in the anomalous zone of the Sea of Azov, and this is a very expensive and troublesome undertaking. Nevertheless, the number of tragic cases in Yuryevka has already exceeded the mark when it is time to deal with the issue in an adult way. Indeed, until now, a significant part of the cases with drowned people is attributed to their drunken state and carelessness of behavior in the water. What percentage of them corresponds to the real state of affairs, no one can say today.

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The tragic mysteries of Azov

...Kamysh-Burunsky iron ore plant in Kerch a few years ago mined Kerch iron ore at Kamysh-Burunsky and Eltigen-Ortelsky iron ore deposits. The total volume of ore extraction reached 7.5 million tons, of which 4.5 million tons of sinter was obtained at the sinter plant - an intermediate product for smelting metal at Azovstal in Mariupol. Still hot agglomerate was loaded in the Kamysh-Burun port directly into specially equipped ships - sinter carriers - and this "fiery fleet" followed from Kerch to Mariupol. Agglomerate was loaded from wheels, and the ships moved one after another.

On that fateful day when the disaster occurred (end of November 1968), there was a strong storm in the Sea of Azov, caused by the northeast. But the conveyor from the Kerch mine - the sinter plant - the Mariupol blast furnace was operating, and the ships were moving, despite the bad weather. The tug "Communist" brought the lighter "Roksha" to the Kamysh-Burun pier. Lighter "Roksha" is a huge specially equipped barge with a displacement of 4.5 thousand tons, a length of 94 m and a width of up to 13 m. She took on board 3750 tons of sinter, the temperature of which was 600-650 °. There were 13 people on the barge, led by a female captain A.I. Shibaeva. Due to difficulties with transport - there were no tickets for passing ships to Mariupol - several passengers boarded the barge, no one knows how many. Nord-Ost battered the ship throughout the entire route, and at night a 6-7-magnitude storm hit it near Mariupol - 17.5 miles southeast of the southern tip of the Berdyansk Spit. outer skin barge leaked. The internal heat-resistant lining also could not withstand the blows. Cold water penetrated into the hold and actually caused an explosion from interaction with the hot sinter. There is a version that the covers of the holds were also broken. Having taken 700 tons of water, the lighter capsized and sank. One way or another, but in tow with horror they saw a huge cloud of steam instead of a lighter. The tugboat team could not do anything, it was not possible to save people. Everyone on the barge died. They managed to put on life jackets, but, presumably, the main enemy was not water, but hot steam. The sea scattered the bodies of the dead. The body of a female captain was found on the Arabat Spit.

The navigation safety service of the Azov Shipping Company immediately outlined the wreck of the sunken "Roksha", sticking out of the water by one meter (Fig. 53). It was forbidden to take passengers on board sinter carriers. Hydrographers welded a metal truss with a luminous sign to the Roksha's hull.

The circumstances of the death of the sinter truck were considered by a special government commission. The causes of the accident are not entirely clear, but shipbuilders suggest that the leak arose from hull wear. This is also confirmed by eyewitnesses. Boatswain "Roksha" Venedikt Fedorovich Groshev accidentally did not go on this fateful voyage. He says that the lighter was already old and rusty, the registration period of the ship's mechanisms had already been worked out, the ship went on a voyage without registration documents. The plan for transporting the agglomerate was frustrated and it was carried out at any cost.

The hull of the Roksha was resting near the fairway of the canal in Mariupol, and this created a danger to navigation. The Azov Shipping Company decided to remove the Roksha from the fairway. Explosions divided the hull into several parts, and in the summer they pulled out everything except the bow. Work on lifting the remains of the hull was planned to be completed in the summer of 1973. 2 buoys were placed at the bow of the Roksha. The troubles, however, did not end there.

Captain 2nd rank B.V. Sokolov, long years who served as the head of the Kerch-Azov region of the hydrographic service of the Black Sea Fleet, says that in the same winter, in March, he was awakened at night and handed over: the Greek ship "Agios Nikoleos" with a displacement of 4 thousand tons, a length of 85 m, a width of 12.6 m, a height side 7.4 m, loaded with coal, followed with a pilot on board from Berdyansk and at night stumbled upon the remains of the Roksha hull, because. the buoys were not lit. Within 17 minutes, the Greek ship sank three miles west of the place of the death of the "Roksha" (N 47 ° 28 "67, E 37 ° 04'93). The depth of the sea at the place of the ship's death - 12 m. The sinter carrier Enakievo, passing by, picked up the entire Greek crew and our pilot. The pilot tried to organize the rescue of the ship, but the Greeks simply dragged him into the boat by force. The hole in the hull of the Greek steamer was huge - up to 6 m. Immediately a commission was sent from Kerch, headed by the captain of the Kerch port, Leonid Denisovich Samborsky. The hydrographic vessel GS-103, diving boats participated in the work. One of the hydrograph officers who participated in the work reported to B.V. Sokolov that the buoys around the rest of the Roksha hull were on fire, and the Greek ship sank 3.5 miles from the Roksha. The divers found that the "Greek" ran into the bow of an old riveted ship. They began to find out. It turned out that at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War the tanker "Ivan Bohun" left Mariupol and died. Divers found round pits around the hull - funnels. On the next year the rescue service sent a three-hundred-ton crane to lift the remains of the Rocsha, but they could not be found. The buoys stood still, the ill-fated Rocsha was gone. There was a version that the remains of the lighter were stolen for scrap. It was, perhaps, a fantasy. They weighed 150 tons, and powerful crane, capable of lifting them, was alone in the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov. B.V. Sokolov believes that the bow of the Roksha was moved by ice, the thickness of which in that winter reached 60-80 cm in the northern part of the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov. I even had to overtake the icebreaker from the Baltic in order to break through the fairway in the ice (the Baltic did not freeze that year!). The ice hummed, and he took with him the bow of the barge, frozen into the ice field. The search for the rest of the "Bohun" yielded nothing. The Greek ship was initially protected by buoys, and in 1977 it was blown up and raised, after unloading the coal.

There have been accidents with sinter trucks before. So, in the fifties, a lighter of the Pervomaisk type sank in Azov. It was a lighter "Zaporozhye", with a displacement of about 3 thousand tons, owned by the Azov Shipping Company, it followed from Mariupol to Kerch with a cargo of coal. On May 1, 1957, the lighter collided with the bulk carrier Karaganda, which had a displacement of 10 thousand tons. As a result of the collision, the lighter Zaporozhye sank to the bottom. In 1961, the tug "Priboy" stumbled upon the sunken ship. There were, however, no special consequences.

On January 29, 1970, in the Sea of Azov, a disaster occurred with the medium Black Sea seiner "Pioneer" (with a displacement of 90 reg. tons). The ship left the port of Temryuk for the port of Kerch, but in the conditions of a six-magnitude storm due to loss of orientation at 23:00 at full speed ran into the stones of Cape Kamenny. Attempts to get off the rocks under their own power failed. The courts that quickly arrived at the scene of the accident could not remove the Pioneer from the shallows due to the intensifying storm. The seiner remained on the rocks, the crew was removed, the hull was smashed against the rocks. The cause of the accident was the negligence of the navigators. (265)

The day of January 8, 1982 was tragic for the Azov basin. More precisely, the night of January 8. A strong winter storm led to the death of three medium-sized Black Sea seiners that day in the southern part of the Sea of Azov near the Kerch Strait. At night, the ships were thrown onto the coastal cliffs in conditions of strong north-east, high waves, snowfall and zero visibility.

SChS-151 died four miles west of Cape Zyuk. The team was removed by helicopters.

SChS-1239 washed ashore at Cape Zyuk. The crew managed to get ashore on their own.

In the Enikale Khroni area, at the entrance to the Kerch Strait, at 2 a.m., SChS-1148 was smashed against the coastal rocks. The captain and chief engineer were killed. The rest of the crew was removed by helicopter pilots.

Tough night...

Navigation in the Sea of Azov requires attention. Even special attention, because shallow waters, unpredictable processes create a danger to navigation. In addition, the lost ships complicate the approaches to the northern ports and it is necessary to constantly work to maintain the shipping channels in order. But sinter trucks are not visible in Azov: the Kamysh-Burun plant no longer produces ore.

The death of ships in the Sea of Azov is not new. The already given statistics for the last century testifies: every year dozens of ships perished in this small reservoir. Since then, the composition of the fleet has improved, the weather service has improved, the training of crews has improved.

But... Disasters still happen, and especially often with small vessels.

The fresh one breaks. Rushing on rampage

Sea of Azov trough

Watermelon on watermelon - and the hold is loaded,

The pier is covered with watermelons.

A breaker strikes a thick bearded man,

To scatter with splashes,

I will choose a ringing kavun like a tambourine

And I'll cut out the heart with a knife ...

The desert sun sets in the brine

And the month will be pushed out in waves ...

Fresh blows!

Backhand!

Dubok, move the sails!

The sea is full of thick lambs,

And watermelons rub, and it's dark in the hold ...

In two fingers, like a boatswain, the wind whistles,

And the clouds are tightly packed

And the steering wheel fidgets, and the casing cracks,

And canvases are taken into the reefs.

Through the waves - right through!

Through the rain - at random!

In whistling persecuted soap,

We grope to the touch

Upset and out of tune

Snoring linen wings.

We're on a wild carousel

And the sea stomps like a market

Throws us aground

We are running aground

Our last Putin.

This description of the Azov storm belongs to the poet E. Bagritsky. (266) Little has changed in nature since 1924.

... Numerous cases of detection in the ocean of ships without crews are known. The mysterious region of the Bermuda Triangle in the Atlantic Ocean is especially distinguished by this. So, from 1840 to 1955. in bermuda triangle a dozen and a half serviceable ships were found, but without crews. Much has been written about the loss of ships in the Devil's Sea, which lies southwest of Japan. Dozens of cases of this kind were described by L. Kusche (267). Among the victims were quite large ships and small sailboats. The planes also disappeared. Here is one of the relatively recent episodes in the Atlantic Ocean.

In July 1969, five (!) Abandoned ships were found in the Atlantic Ocean, and, surprisingly, on one of them, the Teignmouth Electron, Donald Crowhurst, a participant and leader of the round-the-world solo yacht races, disappeared. This was reported by the London Times on July 11, 1969. The weather was excellent, the trimaran yacht was in in perfect order, the log book is full, personal belongings, inflatable boat, life raft - in place. The athlete is gone. On July 27, 1969, The New York Times announced that the search had been called off.

On June 30, 1969, a 60-foot vessel without a crew and keel up was noticed from the board of the English motor ship Maplebank to the northeast of Bermuda (Time, July 12, 1969)

On July 4, the Cotopaxi discovered a 35-foot yacht in the mid-Atlantic with automatic control, but ... without a crew (The Times, July 12, 1969)

On July 6, the Swedish motor ship Golar Frost found the sailing yacht Vagabond in the ocean about 200 miles from the site of the discovery of the Teignmouth Electron yacht. And also without a crew. The yacht was taken on board by the Swedes (The Times, July 12, 1969)

On July 8, between Bermuda and the Azores, an inverted 36-foot yacht was picked up by the English tanker Khilisoma (New York Times, July 13, 1969). All ships were found in a calm ocean, in clear and calm weather. A representative of the Lloyd's Marine Insurance Company, regarding the misfortunes with sailing ships in the Bermuda Triangle and the Central Atlantic, said: "Well, miracles are happening on such a patch of such a huge ocean." All this looks strange. The newspaper campaign devoted to these events in the West continued for a long time and attracted public attention. Having read L. Kusche's book on the Bermuda Triangle, I did not even imagine that such mysterious events were possible in domestic waters. One such grave case in the Sea of Azov was written about in the Soviet press, but much less. And yet the case was completely unexpected and mysterious.

... The Mariupol school for young sailors in the Donetsk region decided that in mid-July 1989, the cadets, under the guidance of experienced sailors, would conduct maritime practice on "small ships on a round-Azov cruise and at the same time get acquainted with the main ports of the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov. (268)

There was no radio communication on the ships. This was a big disadvantage of the cruise, due to the poverty of the club. But the sea was its own, nearby. Many sailed without radio communications. Let's manage! - decided the leaders of the cruise.

Nine small ships set off on the journey. For 12 days they were supposed to visit Berdyansk, Kerch, Yeysk. But from Azov campaign only seven ships returned. Two yachts - "Mariupol" and "YAL-6" continued the cruise. And that's where the two yachts disappeared.

There was no news for two days. On the third day, two cruise participants came to the club in Mariupol - Svetlana Tkacheva, a seventeen-year-old girl, a crane operator of the Azovmash association, and a ten-year-old schoolboy, the nephew of the yacht captain Sergey Maksimenko. The story shocked the leaders of the club.

On that rainy day, nothing foreshadowed trouble. By evening, dinner was cooked on the yacht in the galley, and the attendant jumped into the boat along with dinner. A line of the Long Spit was visible in the distance. The boy and girl went to the cockpit to sleep. Through a dream, the girl heard how the head of the cruise, Dmitry Kharkov, called cadet Volodya Golovin from the cockpit. In the morning, still dark, they woke up from the fact that the yacht was rocking. There was no one on deck and no one at the helm either. "YAL-6" was nearby. They suspected that the entire crew, all ten people, were on the boat. The boy waved the lamp-carrier for a long time - no one responded. They shouted for a long time - there was no answer. The oncoming wave swept the yacht off the shoal. The boy managed to start a diesel engine, chose an anchor, approached the boat - no one. They still hoped that the others were swimming somewhere. For two days the yacht reached the lighthouse on the Long Spit. We ran out of fuel, set sail. In the morning, fishermen on a motorboat passed by, but, obviously, the guys did not understand and passed by. Seryozha and Svetlana anchored the yacht, put their belongings in a bag, and moved ashore. We got to Yeysk by bus. There were no tickets for the Comet from Yeysk to Mariupol. With tears, Sveta persuaded the captain to take them on board and immediately appeared at the club.

Stormy wind and strong seas led to the wreck of several ships in the Azov and Black Seas on November 11. The wind speed in the area of the Kerch Strait connecting them reached 32 meters per second, and the sea waves - six to seven points. According to the Ministry of Emergency Situations, at 06.00 on Monday, four ships sank in one day, six more ran aground, two tankers were damaged, one barge is drifting.

As RIA Novosti was told in the press service of the regional department of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Russian Federation, there have never been incidents like the current one in the Kerch Strait. Representatives of the Ministry of Emergency Situations suggested that the cause of the emergency could be that the crews of the ships neglected the storm warning that was sent out on Saturday.

According to the Ministry of Emergency Situations, at 08:00 Moscow time on November 11, 59 ships were in the area of the Kavkaz port, and all captains received information about the worsening weather. But the weather conditions turned out to be even worse than predicted. In addition, the peculiarity of the Kerch Strait is that there are few bays for sheltering ships from a storm.

SHIPwreck

At 04.45 Moscow time on Sunday, south of Port Kavkaz, at the offshore parking lot, during a storm, the Volgoneft-139 tanker, loaded with more than 4,000 tons of fuel oil, broke in half. There were 13 crew members on board the tanker.

"The ship loaded the oil products in Samara and was heading for unloading to Ukraine," said Vladimir Erygin, head of the administration of the Novorossiysk Commercial Sea Port.

"As a result of the accident, the bow remained at anchor, while the stern with crew members is drifting." By the evening of November 11, the stern part of the tanker, with the help of its own ship's power, ran aground in the area of the Tuzla spit.

Rescuers removed 13 people from the ship and delivered them to the Kavkaz port. A representative of the Port of Kavkaz told RIA Novosti that no one was injured in the incident with the Volgoneft-139 tanker, but about one thousand tons of fuel oil spilled into the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov.

At 10.25 am on November 11, the cargo ship Volnogorsk sank, carrying more than 2.6 thousand tons of sulfur. The crew of eight left the ship on a life raft and managed to land on the Tuzla Spit. They were hospitalized in the central regional hospital of the city of Temryuk.

These are captain Sergey Porkhonyuk, first navigator Viktor Ponomarev, electrician Vadim Maslyukov, minder Dmitry Slegontov, cook Natalia Bobokhina, minder Denis Marov, third navigator Alexei Dobrovidov, minder Alexei Golovachev.

Having stumbled upon the sunken "Volnogorsk", he received a hole and another bulk carrier with sulfur - "Kovel" - began to sink. The crew of the "Kovel" was transferred by rescuers to a tow, there was no fuel spill. At 19.00 Moscow time on November 11, the Kovel completely sank.

The dry cargo ship "Nakhichevan" with 2,000 tons of sulfur also sank. Currently, three of the 11 crew members of this cargo ship have been rescued. The search for the rest of the crew continued at night. They were attended by four Russian ships - "Proteus", "Poseidon", Mercury" and "Captain Zadorozhny".

A six-point storm also caused the non-self-propelled barge "Dika" to run aground in the southwestern part of the Tuzla Spit. On board are two people and 4.149 tons of fuel oil. There is no fuel leak. In the same area, a marine floating crane with one person ran aground.

On the evening of November 11, the press service of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of Ukraine reported that a Russian tug "MB 1224" with 13 crew members ran aground off the northwestern coast of Crimea during a storm. According to the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the tugboat is located at a distance of 15-20 meters from the shore in the area of Uzkaya Bay, not far from the village of Chernomorskoye. The ship was moving from the city of Azov to the mouth of the Danube.

And in the region of Novorossiysk, Greek and Turkish bulk carriers ran aground, Vladimir Erygin, head of the administration of the Novorossiysk seaport, told RIA Novosti. According to him, in both cases, the captains lost control in a storm.

In addition, on the night of November 11, the cargo ship Khash-Izmail sank in Sevastopol, sailing under the Georgian flag with a cargo of metal from Mariupol to Tartu.

The head of the propaganda department of the Sevastopol city administration of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of Ukraine, Valeriy Strelets, said that only two of the 17 crew members were saved. Earlier it was reported that the cargo ship was Russian and the rescuers managed to bring 14 crew members ashore, but Sagittarius denied this information. According to him, the ship did not anchor in Sevastopol and sank, entering the bay, near the Chersonese lighthouse. "They decided to go into the bay to wait out the storm, and while performing the maneuver, they sank," Sagittarius said.

According to the press service of the Crimean Department of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, in the area of Kapsel Bay (the vicinity of Sudak, the eastern part of the southern coast of Crimea), the Ukrainian ship Vera Voloshina, carrying 18 crew members, was stranded. The ship with a cargo of agricultural machinery was heading from Romania to Novorossiysk. Employees of the Crimean Department of the Ministry of Emergency Situations carried out the evacuation of the crew from the ship.

RESCUE AND RELIEF

The storm wind caused significant damage to the infrastructure of Sevastopol - trees were knocked down, power supply was disrupted. Many settlements of Crimea are de-energized, units of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of Crimea, "Krymenergo", RES, gas service eliminate the damage caused by hurricane wind.

The official representative of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, Viktor Beltsov, noted that all the ships that crashed on Sunday belong to the "river-sea" class. "There has not been a single incident with ocean-class ships," he said. According to the Ministry of Emergency Situations, bad weather will continue until November 14.

In order to avoid new shipwrecks, 40 ships were withdrawn from the roadstead of the Kavkaz port due to a strong storm. Ten ships remain in the road, including two bulk carriers with sulfur.

The operational group of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Russian Federation for the Krasnodar Territory operates in the port of Kavkaz, and the operational headquarters of the Southern Regional Center of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Russian Federation operates in Rostov-on-Don. The general management of the rescue operation is carried out by the Ministry of Transport of the Russian Federation, and the coordination of all the forces involved in it is carried out by the Ministry of Emergency Situations of Russia.

As the assistant to the commander-in-chief of the Russian Navy, captain of the first rank Igor Dygalo, told RIA Novosti, the ships of the Black Sea Fleet (BSF) of the Russian Federation are ready to provide assistance to ships in distress.

However, so far no requests for help have been received by the command of the Black Sea Fleet. "On the ships of the Black Sea Fleet moored at the berths in Sevastopol and Novorossiysk, additional mooring lines have been set up. An additional watch has been set up. A search and rescue operation control post has been deployed at the headquarters of the Black Sea Fleet, which monitors and analyzes the situation that is developing at sea," he said. Dygalo.

In connection with the incidents in the Kerch Strait, telephones are opened for relatives of the sailors of the affected ships " hotline", told RIA Novosti a representative of the Southern Regional Center EMERCOM of Russia.

There are two "hot line" telephones in the port "Kavkaz" - (8-86148) 581-45 and 517-48. Two more "hot line" phones work in Krasnodar (8-861) 262-34-46, 262-52-27.

A helicopter of the Ministry of Emergency Situations flew to the disaster area, it is also expected that as soon as the weather permits, two more helicopters will fly from Rostov-on-Don and Sochi.

15 of the 17 crew members of the Khash-Izmail dry-cargo ship that sank in Sevastopol, which sailed under the Georgian flag, are still listed as missing.

ENVIRONMENTAL CONSEQUENCES

He gave other figures - according to him, not one, but more than two thousand tons of fuel oil spilled into the water out of the four thousand tons that were on board the tanker, due to the fact that due to bad weather it was not possible to stop the oil spill from the broken in half of the ship. "The crack, along which the fracture then occurred, is located in the middle, between the third and fourth tanks," Mitvol said.

"There are serious concerns that the oil spill will continue," said the deputy head of Rosprirodnadzor.

As for the sunken cargo ship, according to Mitvol, sulfur is an inert material, and there is hope that it will not enter into any compounds dangerous to humans. In addition, after the storm, rescuers will try to lift containers with sulfur.
"But the bulk carrier (Volnogorsk) also had tanks full of fuel oil. That is, we are dealing with a very serious situation related to the pollution of the Kerch Strait with oil products," Mitvol said.

He noted that oil skimmers cannot work in heavy seas, and fuel oil begins to sink to the bottom and will “create an increased background of oil content in water” for several years.

“That is, this problem can turn into a problem for several years. Work to restore the ecological state of the Kerch Strait will take more than one month,” Mitvol said, pointing out that the technology for collecting fuel oil is very complex and expensive.
The President of the Russian Green Cross, Academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences Sergey Baranovsky, on the contrary, believes that the sulfur cargo on dry cargo ships sunk due to a storm in the Kerch Strait is more harmful to the environment than an oil spill.

wrecks

Dry cargo ship "Volnogorsk" project 21-88 was built in 1965 at the shipbuilding enterprise Slovenske Lodenice (Komarno, Czechoslovakia). The vessel is 103.6 meters long, 12.4 meters wide, and has a draft of 2.8 meters. The carrying capacity of the vessel is two thousand tons. Until 2007, the ship was owned by the Azov-Don Shipping Company, located in Rostov-on-Don.

Dry cargo ship "Nakhichevan" of the same design was built in 1966, it is owned by the State Corporation "Azov-Don Shipping Company".

The dry-cargo ship "Kovel" was built in 1957 according to project 576. Similar ships were built at the Nizhny Novgorod plant "Krasnoye Sormovo" and in Romania. Dry cargo carriers of this type are designed for the transportation of bulk, bulk, container-piece cargo, such as building rubble, sand, coal, paper in rolls, timber in logs. According to media reports, "Kovel" belongs to OJSC "SK" Volga Shipping Company ".

Dry cargo ship "Kaunas" of this type in August 2002 crashed into the Liteiny Bridge on the Neva in St. Petersburg. The motor ship, on board of which there were almost two thousand tons of metal, received a hole and sank, and for four days blocked the movement of ships along the Neva. During this time, more than 300 ships accumulated on both sides of the river, waiting for the passage. The cause of the accident was the failure of the steering gear. After the accident, the cargo ship was decommissioned.

In November 2003, the motor ship "Victoria" of the same project ran aground in the Tsimlyansk reservoir, no one was injured. According to media reports, the captain of the Victoria, at the direction of the company's management, transshipped more than 300 tons. At the entrance to the Tsimlyansk reservoir, the ship began to roll, and water began to flow into the hull. In order to avoid flooding, the captain decided to put the ship aground.

The Volgoneft-139 tanker that broke in the Kerch Strait was built in 1978. It belongs to OAO Volgotanker. According to the website of the owner of the vessel, this tanker has eight tanks for transporting fuel oil, a double side and a double bottom. The first tanker of the Volgoneft series was built in 1962. They are being built at the Volgograd shipyard, at shipbuilding enterprises in the Bulgarian cities of Varna and Ruse.

The tanker is designed to transport crude oil and petroleum products, its length is 132.6 meters, width - 16.9 meters, draft - 3.5 meters. The carrying capacity of the tanker is five thousand tons. On board "Volgoneft-139" were 4.777 thousand tons of fuel oil.

There are several projects of tankers of this series - 550, 550A, 558, 630, 1577. They differ in carrying capacity, pipeline design, superstructure, and mast design. 65 tankers of the 550A project, to which Volgoneft-139 belongs, and more than 200 tankers of other projects were built.

In December 1999, a similar incident occurred with the Volgoneft-248 tanker of project 1577. It broke under the impact of a powerful wave and sank during a storm in the Sea of Marmara off the coast of Turkey on December 29, 1999. The Coast Guard managed to evacuate 15 crew members from the ship. About 800 tons of fuel oil spilled into the sea.

In the summer of 2002, the Komsomol Volgograd tanker (originally Volgoneft-213) ran aground on the Svir River near St. Petersburg. The cause of the accident was a technical malfunction of the steering. The tanker received three holes, but there was no oil spill.

The material was prepared by the online editors www.rian.ru based on information from RIA Novosti

It would seem that what can happen on the world's smallest, warm and calm Sea of Azov? Alas, the tragedies of recent years, including the current swimming season, confirm that the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov, despite the external calm and grace, is fraught with a lot of mysteries and dangers.

Quite recently, in the village of Yuryevka, located on the shores of the Sea of Azov, fifty kilometers from Mariupol, a tragic incident occurred, which is called out of the ordinary. At a depth of only about a meter, twenty meters from the shore, a twelve-year-old boy almost drowned. Two adult, physically strong thirty-year-old guys who came to his aid were able to push the boy out of the water, but they themselves became victims of the deep sea.

It was nine o'clock in the morning, the adults were sober, relaxing on the beach with their families. How such a tragedy could happen is incomprehensible. The surviving boy says that he was playing ball with his uncle in the Sea of Azov and suddenly the sand began to suddenly disappear from under his feet. He began to shout, his uncle rushed to the rescue, who had moved away at that time for the ball that had flown off to the side. Uncle arrived in time, pushed the boy aground, but he began to sink. Seeing such a picture, another man rushed to help. They and the rescuers who came to the rescue pulled the boy out of the water, but unknown sea forces pulled two adult men under the water. How could this happen? What is the cause of the tragedy? Is this a one of a kind case? Let's try to deal with these issues in order.

One of the versions is the sea currents of the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov and the whirlpools caused by them. Yuryevka is located between two spits Belosaraiskaya and Berdyanskaya. When two currents meet in the Yalta Bay, sea water swirls, often resulting in whirlpools. Fishermen say that sometimes the boats turn so that it is difficult to pull out. The locals do not remember the cases when the boats sank due to the whirlpool, in the worst case they were carried to the sea. That is, there is no need to talk about some huge whirlpools in the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov.

According to the head of the recreation department of the regional landscape park "Meotida" Andrey Kiyanenko, currents and whirlpools in the Sea of Azov are strong not only in the Yuryevka area, but especially at the ends of the Azov spits - on Belosaraiskaya, Berdyanskaya, Dolgaya, Sedov Spit, and other unique according to its formation of the Azov spits. Tragic cases when people were carried away to the Sea of Azov not only on air mattresses, but also without them happened before. Drowning on the scythes, even athletes who were quite prepared for high water.

So, exactly twenty years ago, if we count from the day of the tragedy in Yuryevka, on July 15, 1989, the crews of 9 ships of the city Young Sailors Club left Mariupol for the Sea of Azov. After a twelve-day voyage, the training ship "Orion", 2 motorboats and 4 boats returned, and two ships with seven adult crew members and five cadets had to sail further to make a circle around the Sea of Azov with a stop at Yeysk, Kerch and Berdyansk. At noon on July 28, the executive committee of the Mariupol City Council received the first alarming information: the ships were at the Dolgaya Spit, the crews were missing. An emergency commission of the city executive committee was created without delay. Vessels of the Azov Sea and Volga-Don River Shipping Companies located in the waters of the sea, rescue vessels of the Black Sea Fleet rescue service, rescue equipment of fishing collective farms of the Krasnodar Territory, military aircraft and helicopters, aviation of the traffic police of the Internal Affairs Directorate of the Donetsk region were involved in the search for the missing.

On the evening of July 31, military pilots from Rostov-on-Don reported: in the area of the village of Kamyshevatskaya, not far from Yeisk and the Dolgaya Spit, bodies were found washed up by waves on the shore. Soon - a new message: found 5 more bodies. And only in the second half of the next day was the tenth dead crew member discovered. The surviving two passengers of the yacht - a boy of eight and a seventeen-year-old girl - did not clarify the course of events. When asked where the others were, they said they were sleeping and didn't see anything. At the dawn of perestroika, this mysterious case was discussed in the press for a long time and did not leave the lips of ordinary people. The culprit for the death of an entire team was considered by some to be UFOs, others as poachers, whose illegal fishing was allegedly witnessed by young sailors.

As the two survivors later said, they woke up at the same time in the middle of the night with a feeling of inexplicable anxiety. The sailors' clothes were scattered randomly on the deck. The depth in that place was negligible - the yacht was aground, where the bottom is visible from any side. The yachtsmen with whom we spoke believe that the reason for the death of the guys could be strong sea currents running along the tip of the Dolgaya Spit, caused by a surge wave. Most likely, the guys climbed into the water to push the boat aground, fell into the current, the rest rushed to save them and were also carried into the sea one by one.

I would not like to turn to mysticism, but in all these accidents there are still several fatal coincidences and magical numbers. The boat, which, perhaps indirectly, caused the death of the crew in 1989, at that time it was called Arktos, exactly 13 years later, and, more incredibly, again on July 25, converted by this time into a yacht with a new name " Mariupol" drowned five passengers and sank herself. In the area of the village of Melekino, she rolled vacationers. Despite the fact that it was designed for only 10 people, the captain took 38 passengers on board. From a small wave, one and a half kilometers from the shore, the yacht capsized. The ship rolled over on its side and slowly began to sink. Of the 38 passengers, 33 were rescued. Interestingly, after the tragedy, the yacht was lifted from the bottom by a floating crane of the Mariupol port, was stored in the port for about a year, and then taken out in an unknown direction, its further fate is unknown to us. Will it be restored and launched again? It is quite possible, although the yachtsmen with whom we spoke believe that such an unfortunate yacht should still be looked for, and it would be best to simply destroy it, burn it, and scatter the ashes over Sea of Azov. But back to our main question.

Spit Dolgaya, if anyone does not know, is located on the opposite coast of the Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov, on the territory of the Russian Federation. In the Soviet years, when there were virtually no borders between our countries, Mariupol yachtsmen often sailed on the other side of the Sea of Azov. If you look at the map of the Sea of Azov, it is noticeable that the Dolgaya Spit is located almost directly opposite the Belosaraiskaya Spit. Thus, the flow of the water mass in this place passes as through the neck of a bottle and, accordingly, increases. With a surge wave caused by the western and southwestern winds, the level of the Sea of Azov in the area of the Taganrog Bay sometimes rises to two meters. When the winds weaken, the water rushes back, and in a rather swift stream.

An acquaintance of the author of these lines has recently personally seen how dangerous the ends of the Azov spits can be - he saved a girl of about twelve years old at the tip of Belosaraika. While her parents were enthusiastically chatting on the shore, she ran aground about fifty meters from the shore, you can’t say otherwise - into the open sea, because at the tip of the spit the sea is almost from all sides. The depth for her growth was slightly above the waist, but at the same time she could not get out of the sea on her own. She managed to hit just at the junction of two currents, this was clearly indicated by the waves rolling on each other from different sides at an angle of about fifty degrees. “In the beginning, she didn’t understand that things were wrong and calmly jumped on the waves, but then horror appeared on her face,” said a friend. “She tried to go to the shore, and the sea dragged her back. Surely, in such an unequal struggle, she would have had enough not for long, especially since physically the girl was clearly not an athlete.When I approached her, despite the relatively calm surface of the water, I felt a mighty river flowing along the bottom.The current was so strong that I could hardly stand on my feet. I was frightened in earnest. I told the girl to hold on to my hand, and so, step by step, we gradually got out into shallow water, and then to the shore. If it were a little deeper, I would not have overcome the current ... ".

Such a power lives in the "gentle" Sea of \u200b\u200bAzov. The author of these lines, as an admirer of rest on the Belosarayskaya Spit, himself repeatedly tested the strength of this current. At the very end of the spit it is better not to swim at all, but before reaching its last point you can. The main thing is to stay no more than ten to fifteen meters from the shore at all times, and that the depth should not be above the waist. You can get interesting sensations. You just need to relax, lie on your back, and the current itself will carry you along the shore at about the speed of a person walking at a fast pace, - it has been verified. Although such a strong current is not always the case. Such is the river in the sea - exotic! But this exotic would be good if it had not ruined so many people.

According to Andrei Kiyanenko, there are fewer cases of drowned people on spits than in other places only because the number of vacationers on them is much smaller. And on the Sedov spit, the guards of the Meotida Landscape Park do not let vacationers to the tip of the spit at all, they protect the bird nests. Things are worse on the Belosarayskaya Spit. Every year more and more vacationers come here, to the tip of the spit, and many of them are not even aware of the danger posed by this beautiful place on the Sea of Azov.

But the tragedy that occurred in Yuryevka cannot be unambiguously blamed on sea currents. Firstly, near the shore at shallow depths, they are not strong enough to drag and drown two young physically strong men who can swim. Secondly, Yuryevka is located practically in the Yalta Bay and the currents here are extremely weak. For some reason, no such cases were noted in the neighboring villages of Yalta and Urzuf. Moreover, they were not there, not according to official data, namely, according to local residents, including Meotida employees. The most dangerous place, according to the Yuryevites, is located on the outskirts of Yuryevka, from the side of Urzuf, in an area with a self-explanatory name - Cape Serpentine.

He does not believe that the cause of the tragedy in Yuryevka was the currents and the head of the Mariupol public environmental organization "Clean Coast", a sailor and yachtsman Yulian Mikhailov.

“There is a muddy bottom there, almost a swamp, what strong currents can there be?” he asks. about the Yalta Bay of funnels capable of pulling an adult who can swim a man under water.In marine sailing directions (reference books for sailors) there is also no mention of strong currents in this area.I can only guess about the causes of natural anomalies in Yuryevka, but it is not the marine ones who are to blame for them currents".

The head of the nature department of the Mariupol Museum of Local Lore, geologist Olga Shakula agrees with the opinion of the yachtsman-ecologist. According to her, the reason lies rather in the fact that just in the area of \u200b\u200bCape Zmeinny there is a global geological fault between bedrock slabs at a depth of about one kilometer. It crosses the entire Sea of Azov and creates seismic activity in Crimea. In the course of geological movements, the plates overlap each other, crumble, and shift the upper soil layers. By the way, the output of fragments of these rocks appears on the surface in the ill-fated, widely known radioactive "black" sands, which are based on radioactive thorium. In addition to the release of sands, the geological instability of the area also contributes to massive movements of the upper part of the earth's surface, including leading to mudflows and landslides that occur not only on land, but also under the sea water layer.

“Five years ago we rested in Yuryevka with the families and employees of our museum,” says Olga Shakula. “Our colleague almost drowned at a shallow depth, before our eyes she began to sink into the sand, screamed, we realized from her face that she did not jokes, my husband would not have had time to swim, and therefore he threw a children's inflatable ring to her. It all happened in a matter of seconds, a colleague still believes that the circle thrown by her husband saved her life. "

There is also another phenomenon in Yuryevka - the release of gas to the surface. Locals say that in winter, when the Sea of Azov is covered with a crust of thin transparent ice, accumulations of gas bubbles under the ice are very clearly visible. Children even have entertainment - to drill a small hole in the ice and set fire to the gas that comes out of it.

Experts note that no extensive scientific research on the impact of the geological fault on the ecology of the Sea of Azov in its northern part has been carried out. The coast of the Sea of Azov is fraught with a lot of unsolved mysteries. Unfortunately, some of these mysteries lead to terrible consequences, and therefore, in our opinion, deserve closer, detailed scientific study. The number of tragic cases in Yuryevka has already exceeded the mark when it is time to deal with the issue in an adult way. Indeed, until now, a significant part of the cases with drowned people is attributed to their drunken state and carelessness of behavior in the water. What percentage of them corresponds to the real state of affairs - no one can say today. Now the beaches of the Azov coast are being checked by the Commission for Technogenic Safety of the Ministry of Emergency Situations of Ukraine. The beaches of the village of Yuryevka also fell into the sphere of her attention. There are no official results of the investigation, according to representatives of the local Ministry of Emergency Situations. Meanwhile, vacationers are dying at sea under the most mysterious circumstances.

Vadim NOVOSELOV

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The wreck of ships in the Kerch Strait: a chronicle and causes of the disaster. Anomalous zones of the Sea of ​​Azov