We built BAM - BAM built us. Eastern BAM

JW our way onBAM : V In July 1974, the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted Decree No. 561 on the construction of the Baikal-Amur Railway. The word "BAM" came into life rapidly and firmly established itself in it. Millions of people looked at geographical maps with interest in order to connect Baikal and Amur with their mind's eye.
I was struck by the vast expanses of the region, the grandiose scope of the upcoming construction. The main line crossed an extremely complex natural region, most of it passed in the mountains, and the central section - in a zone of high seismicity, met with such full-flowing rivers as the Lena, Upper Angara, Olekma, Gilyui, Selemdzha, Byssa, Bureya, Amgun, Amur, passed over vast areas of permafrost. In these northern regions, where the earth is shrouded in 50-60-degree frosts, there were almost no roads, not even trails. The rare Evenk settlements that found shelter along the banks of the rivers were separated from each other by many kilometers of taiga.
857 Training Center of the Railway Troops was established on August 1, 1996 on the basis of 1 separate training railway regiment, which began its history on October 5, 1918. During the entire period of activity of the military unit, its main task was the training of highly qualified sergeants and junior specialists intended to fill positions that determine the combat capability of military units and formations of the Railway Troops. Over the past years, tens of thousands of junior commanders and specialists have been released from the military unit and sent to the troops. Graduates of the training military unit performed their tasks with honor and dignity on the fronts of the Great Patriotic War, during the restoration of railways in the war and post-war period. The personnel made a great contribution to the development of the country's railway transport during the construction of the Ivdel-Ob, Abakan-Taishet, Tyumen-Surgut, Baikal-Amur Mainline railway lines. Hundreds of graduates of the unit were awarded government awards for the successes achieved in improving the combat readiness of military units and formations of troops. Currently, the Training Center of the Railway Troops continues to train squad commanders and specialist soldiers. Training is conducted in 14 specialties, determined by the order of the Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation of 2006 No. 480 “On approval of the List of military positions filled by soldiers, sailors, sergeants and foremen, for which military personnel are subject to training in training formations and military units of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation”.

How BAM started

In 1974, Stepan Fedorenko was transferred from sunny Baku to serve in cold Tynda. The officer was warned that the family should not be taken to BAM, because there were no living conditions there. Tynda was still a miserable village then, the retired colonel recalls.

“Our brigade was tasked with meeting construction cargoes at the Skovorodino station and transporting them in columns to the points where military units should be stationed. Shields for the barracks and the dining room, food were transported along the Lena highway, - says Stepan Fedorenko. - There were no roads to the east, our guys were thrown there by helicopters. They left bags of food for them, and they built a winter hut, cut clearings. We were instructed to equip military units and build a road along the future railway line. The second task was to assist in the construction of the Small BAM. The railway was supposed to arrive in Tynda by May 1, 1975.

In 1974, relations with the Chinese were strained. Therefore, the railroad soldiers had to encrypt, communicate by radio under the code names Worker, Foreman, Master. 40 years have already passed, but Stepan Stepanovich easily reproduces the episodes of those days one after another.

The military was not at all prepared for the local winters. The built barracks froze through. The soldiers erected larch log cabins, the joints were insulated with moss, the windows were cut through with the Druzhba chainsaw, and large tents were pulled over wooden boxes. Such buildings, in contrast to the "barrels of Diogenes", in which steam came from the mouth in winter, kept warm.

- We had no idea that in winter it could be 60 degrees below zero. Our thermometers were calculated down to minus 50. In the mornings they went off scale, - Stepan Stepanovich recalls. - In order not to catch a cold, they ate garlic and onions, which were sent to us in parcels. Each carried garlic cloves in his pocket. There were also problems in the spring, especially when the rivers melted. There was a case: a car with building materials fell through the ice, and the soldier, by the time he reached the shore, was like in a glass suit. The poor fellow was brought to his senses with alcohol.

Courage Exam

The soldiers still managed to create a normal life in the taiga. Bathhouses were built in units, bread was baked in field ovens.

Military railroad workers left for work early, the stars were still shining in the sky, they also returned with them. They cut a clearing, built a road, laid rails that were supposed to reach Komsomolsk-on-Amur.

The 35th brigade of railway troops was a small state. It included 12 military units, about 15 thousand personnel, a military court, a prosecutor's office, a military department and a special department. The headquarters was located in Tynda. The military settled in the area, which was popularly called "Squirrel", in honor of the first cafe that opened in the city. By the way, Stepan Stepanovich keeps a piece of the red ribbon from the opening of Belochka.

With the assignment of the city status to Tynda, it began to change rapidly. Kindergartens, schools were opened, temporary settlements were rebuilt. With the arrival of shock troops, the first families began to form at BAM. Wives and children began to come to the military. Together with Stepan Stepanovich, his wife Taisiya Vasilievna served at BAM, she worked in the hospital, and her daughters Irina and Ella.

– Where the trains go today, the life of our parents passed. I was then a schoolgirl. Most of all, I remember how fresh vegetables arrived in the stores by the New Year, but there were very few of them, so they were distributed equally to everyone, regardless of official position. On the festive table were one chopped cucumber and two tomatoes. Fresh vegetables were valued at BAM more than red or black caviar. Some people associate the New Year with the smell of tangerines, but for BAM children, the New Year is the smell of a fresh cucumber, says Ella.

We gave the country a road

In 1979, for health reasons, Stepan Stepanovich had to leave the construction site. At that time, in the eastern section, the rails were already approaching the Zeya River. For their service at BAM, the Fedorenko spouses were awarded medals "For the construction of BAM".

After Tynda, the family went to Ukraine, to Dnepropetrovsk. It was already the twelfth place of service. And our hero left for a well-deserved rest, having gone from lieutenant to colonel. Now the Fedorenko family lives in Gelendzhik. Stepan Stepanovich is the deputy chairman of the city council of veterans, for many years he has been defending the interests of war veterans and home front workers.

– This year marks the 40th anniversary of the construction of BAM. Today, the word "BAM" is pronounced differently, but then it sounded such an upsurge and enthusiasm, with which it is now difficult to associate anything. After 40 years, I would very much like to visit Tynda in order to transfer to the Museum of the History of BAM the silver crutches that I received at the laying of the last link and at the rail joints at the first stations, as well as the Bamstroyput newspaper, ribbons, pennants and badges of those years - says Stepan Fedorenko.

In his eighty, the military does not complain about his health. He says that he has the strength and a great desire to travel by train along the eastern section of the BAM, which was built by railroad soldiers, to meet with colleagues and remember the past.

On the picture: Wedding photography on rails invented at BAM

Svetlana Nazarchuk

Good day! Dear reader!

From 1985 to 1987 I served in the Soviet Army. Namely, in the railway troops. Then I did not think that I would get into these troops. And I didn't think they existed. When passing the commission at the military registration and enlistment office, many of us were previously enrolled in the missile, border, construction, and landing troops ... But they never heard of the railway. It so happened that most of them got there. I can't say exactly why this happened. But that's how it happened.

I would like to tell you about how I served on the Baikal-Amur Mainline - BAM. Many have heard about this building of the century. But few people know what BAM is. I am very sorry that everything there fell apart due to perestroika. I also note that I do not regret that I was there, despite any difficulties that were. As elsewhere and everywhere, I was lucky to meet good people there. I will try to remember them, whom I knew and remembered. Many thanks to those commanders who were in the unit in which I served. Major Sachenko Leonid Grigorievich - Deputy Chief of Staff of the unit. You can probably say about him that he is a man with a capital letter. Very strict but fair at the same time. Syvorotkin Alexander Nikolaevich (at the time when I served, he was still a major, but during correspondence, after his dismissal, he found out that he had been awarded the rank of lieutenant colonel). A man with a strong and tough character. What I remember is that he's creepy, you know? I smoked SO MUCH. Words cannot describe it. It had to be seen. I would especially like to note our platoon commander Viktor Fedorovich Medvedchuk, who later, after my dismissal, was awarded the rank of senior warrant officer. He commanded our platoon (in the beginning it was a security platoon, then after disbanding it was a support platoon). Very strict! He always strived to ensure that cleanliness and order reigned in our barracks. And I think he succeeded.

I want to say in advance that in my memoirs I will not use dialogue speech. This is due to the fact that after such a long period of time it is impossible to convey them word for word. And almost - do not want to. And what I will write about is all the real events that took place in the brigade battalions of military unit 40976 (this was our brigade - a higher military unit) in the village of Verkhnezeysk, Zeya district of the Amur region.

But a little background on how I got to BAM. In 1985, I finished the 2nd year of the Glazov Pedagogical Institute (Faculty of Physics and Mathematics). And on one of the clear spring days, all of us guys were called urgently from a lecture to the military registration and enlistment office. We had to stay there for a long time. We were warned that in May we would be drafted into the ranks of the USSR Armed Forces. Nobody was happy about it. But no one showed a view. Including me. It was April 1985. And we were faced with the task of passing the exams as quickly as possible. And the exams were in pedagogy, general physics, philosophy. My friend and classmate Dima Fedorov and I began to "storm" these objects. Not even all the lectures and practical exercises have been completed yet. And I can tell you that in general, everyone treated us with understanding. Only officially I had to take an exam in pedagogy. And so, everyone saw our agendas - put the mark "GOOD".

On May 3, we were summoned to the military registration and enlistment office and handed summons for May 11. And all these exams were from 3 to 10 May. Since I lived 23 km from the city in another district, I registered at the military registration and enlistment office and went home. There were escorts at home. For some reason, this guide is associated with the songs of the Yalla group. There was such a group. If, for example, I hear songs performed by this group, then everything is immediately remembered. On May 11, 1985, I boarded the Yar-Izhevsk train. My classmates were already there. Because they sat down from the city of Glazov. Before. We arrived at the assembly point in Izhevsk (the capital of Udmurtia). I remember very well the dining room, where we were immediately sent. They fed very well. We hung our duffel bags on hangers that were installed around the parade ground. During the day we were forced to march. Basically, these were sergeants who arrived at the assembly point along with the "buyers". It was all very dark. I wouldn't want to be there again. For the night we were herded into a room in which there was nothing. Bare walls and floor, painted. They went straight to the floor to sleep. Morning. One can imagine the state of a person who for the first time "sleep" on the floor, where there is no soft pillow, blanket ... Terrible! Yes. There were also such things. The sergeants lined us up and asked us to lay out all the things from our duffel bags. You can imagine the sergeants, who, like big people, walked along the line and took away the "liked" things-products.

But to our surprise, it all ended quickly. Already at noon we were lined up on the parade ground and put into buses and taken to the railway station. We got on the train and off we went. Everyone thought about where they were taking us. The fact is that at the institute we were always frightened by the fact that we would be taken to Afghanistan. Because At that time, the military operations in Afghanistan were in full swing. But, fortunately, when we learned that we were going east, we calmed down a bit. Later we learned that we were going to the Amur Region.

We arrived in Sverdlovsk (Yekaterinburg). We were dropped off the cars and taken to the airport. Not far from the airfield there were tents with bunk beds. The first time I saw these bunk beds. We were there for exactly one day. There were also negative moments. The boys took away food and things from each other. All in all, it's not a pleasant memory. And at night we were put on a TU-134 plane. Again, this was news to me. Flight in an airplane. Never flew before this time. We were also fed there. Liked. When I went to the toilet, I accidentally saw the pilot's office and the Earth appeared before my eyes. It's dark all around, and the sun is rising on the horizon. It was very beautiful.

We flew in the morning to Irkutsk. From Irkutsk by train. Half a day we drove through Lake Baikal. There was still ice. Very beautiful places. For some reason, I don't have any special memories of this "piece". Apparently there was nothing memorable. We arrived at Skovorodino station. This is the station from which the branch "up" goes to Tynda and the other further to Vladivostok. We were all put on a passenger train and went to Tynda. We arrived in Tynda at night at 2.00. And we were all taken to a club. They sat down to watch a movie. Alas! I don't remember the name anymore. But the film was about the war. But almost no one saw the film. Because everyone wanted to sleep. That's how I first began to comprehend a new kind of sleep "Sitting". In the morning they put us back on the train, and we drove on. I don't know how long we traveled, but we reached Dipkun station. Dipkun station stood before my eyes like a settlement with several high-rise buildings, a new store and an unfinished station. We all immediately went to the store. Bought groceries and ate heartily. We stopped at an unfinished train station. It will probably be wrong that I say an unfinished station. In principle, there was already inside and there was light. There were no other people (civilians). There were no seats, the cash registers were not yet open. Apparently, this station was about to open. Already here at this station there were a lot of recruits. Here I felt what "countryman" means. And it doesn’t matter if you are from one city, town or village. Even if you are from neighboring Tatarstan, Bashkiria, Perm, Kirov regions, this is already a "countryman". And the soul rejoices. And there were already Georgians, and Azerbaijanis, Chechens, Kyrgyz, Uzbeks, Tajiks ... It was very surprising to see the clothes that recruits from the southern republics were wearing. Some robes, skullcaps and all that. It was just interesting. Because before the army, I practically did not go anywhere (not counting Krivoy Rog in 1980 and Moscow). So a lot of things were unknown and a bit unusual for me. Despite the fact that everyone seemed to be of the same call, there were clashes based on nationalities. And we with Udmurtia stuck together. And it helped all of us.

And our next trip has already continued in the carriages. This is a covered wagon, which has a corner for escorts (ensign and sergeants). As heating potbelly stove. And there were about 30 of us in this car. The train was moving very slowly. This is understandable. If even now they don’t move along the BAM at high speeds, then even more so. The road was not electrified. Therefore, while we were driving, we heard some people walking and jumping on the roof of the car. At first we did not understand what it could be. But at night we were stopped at some bus stop. Doors open. And there are three soldiers. It's dark, you can hardly see anything. They quickly jumped into the car. They had belts in their hands. The end of the belt is wound on the right hand. And the plaque sags at the other end. And they started swinging those belts. They began to take them out of the car one by one and search the money. But it didn't last that long. I don’t know what moved us, but at one time they all took picket fences that were intended as firewood and, jumping out of the car, gave these old people. And they kind of ran away. In the meantime, we got back into the car and closed. One thing surprises me now. Why didn't our escorts do anything. They were all this time in their corner. But at the same time, I imagine that they were practically powerless to do anything. And so they removed themselves from everything. The train started moving. And we still heard walking on the roof for a while. Then everything was quiet. I now think that perhaps we made a stop at some station where the soldiers were serving (meaning on the highway). Then I already knew that along the BAM highway there were small stations where soldiers served. It is not necessary to understand the word station as some settlements. Basically, it was a separate car (trailer), where there were sidings. Arrows. That's just apparently us and wanted to "rob" these soldiers. But maybe that's not the case.

Morning. We, seeing the rays of the sun, opened the doors. And all the time we drove, admiring the nature that met us at BAM. We arrived at the Zeya reservoir. There is a bridge over the reservoir with a length of about 2 km. The reservoir was still covered with ice. In general, the ice there comes down closer to the middle, the end of June. When we passed the bridge, the train stopped. We were dropped off. Sun was shining. It was very warm. Even "I wanted to live" after everything. We were all taken to the Fokine battalion. This is in honor of the name of the battalion commander is such a name. In general, all parts had such names. "Suleimanovo", "Ugarovo", "Almazovo", "Syvorotkino" ... And so we were taken to the club. The club was big and spacious. There was nothing there. There were several tables, several soldiers at the tables. We realized that now we will be given new clothes. Our accompanying ensign said that we could collect the hats and, if desired, send them back home. Well, we are so naive, we passed everything. He left. And we never saw him again. But we were still in our clothes. We were shown a place to throw our clothes. Some of the boys began to tear their clothes and throw them there. And everyone threw everything off himself. Jackets, shirts, sweaters, trousers, briefs, swimming trunks, socks and shoes. And each of us approached the standing soldiers completely naked. At first, they gave out shorts and a T-shirt, then cotton, tarpaulin boots, belts and caps. Yes, by the way, you still had to tell your correct size so that they would give you clothes according to you. There were those who had no idea what size shoes they wear and clothes. But, somehow, then everything was resolved. Here. I also forgot, they also gave out the famous footcloths. And how without them in the army? And moreover, you still had to be able to wind them. And so we, having put on all these unusual clothes, went to the soldiers' bath. Washed and dressed again. It was very unusual in these clothes. The cotton is absolutely new and tough. We walked there like people who were covered with sacks. We were in this part for about 1 week. What do I remember there? The first time was taken to the dining room. For breakfast. We were surprised that there were pots on the tables, and there was semolina. No, it was not semolina. And mashed potatoes. It just looked like semolina. It was there that we first met the powder (food), from which mashed potatoes were made. And later there we were fed with potatoes, which were cut into long dried parallelepipeds. They were in tin cans. Usually at that time jam was sold in such banks. But there were dried potatoes. She, frankly, for 2 years of service is very tired of me. Probably not because such potatoes, but because the cooks cooked poorly. If they had soaked them properly at first, the taste would have been much better. And this morning there were pieces of butter on all the tables. The sergeants were very surprised by this circumstance. They stood and laughed that, they say, we'll see what happens tomorrow. And they were right. Then there was never butter left on our breakfast tables. The menu hasn't changed much in two years. In the morning a piece of butter, bread, porridge (millet, buckwheat, barley, mostly with stew), coffee. I want to talk about coffee separately. It was just called that. It was a coffee drink. And how they cooked! They pour water into the cauldron, pour this drink in and, the culmination of preparation ... open condensed milk and immediately throw it into this cauldron, without even tearing off the paper. All this boils and like nothing. Soup was usually served for lunch. The second is also porridge with stew or (rarely) fresh meat. The third is compote. Dinner. Here is the potato that I already mentioned and the fish. The fish was supposed to be fried. But the cooks did not want to mess around with this, and they often broke the electric frying pan. And we just boiled the fish. Cooked very interesting. Frozen fish is taken in a tile and placed in boiling water in a cauldron. That's all. Here's to you and bon appetit. In the evening there was always tea at dinner. It happened that the bakery broke down. Then we were given alcoholized long loaves instead of bread. They were all in plastic bags treated with alcohol and tightly closed. Basically, they were fresh.

Well. Here's a bit off topic. There were old-timers in this unit. They kept guarding us at the canteen to take away our belts. And many, when they left the dining room, fastened their belts on their naked bodies under cotton. But they knew we were doing it. And they raised the cotton and took it away. It was on the first day. But, then, seeing such a thing, our platoon leader collected the belts for a while. And we went without belts. I remember the following events. Work in the sawmill. We helped pull out the boards, roll up the logs, take out the shavings. Worked in a warehouse. I don't remember what we did there. But it was good there. Calmly. Nobody pulled. And once sent to the headquarters. They said that some boss was coming, so everything needed to shine. And we worked even after lights out.

Various training sessions were held. Military, political training. And everything else. I liked studying in the Lenin room when there was a theoretical part. You sit and relax from everything.

Once I don’t remember why, but our ensign staged a showdown. He threw everything out, beds, bedside tables. Everything was scattered. I also had my Komsomol ticket lying on the floor. I now think that in this way they tried to scare, or rather, keep everyone. I don't know if this is correct or not. Can such actions be justified? I can't say yes, and I don't want to say. They, too, could be understood.

I remember that as part of the exercises we were picked up at 24:00, put into cars and taken to the track. We stopped at a small bridge. The train came up. There were cobblestones with which they laid bridges. So we were forced to unload and line this bridge. I still remember that moment. We sat down to rest and talked something with one guy. Now I don't remember what his name was. But we calculated how much we still have to serve. It was over 23 months old. But we consoled ourselves with the fact that we had already begun to eat. Not imagining what will happen next. At 3:00 we finished the work. But there was no car. And we walked back. Where to run, where to walk. We got there around 5 o'clock in the morning. And we managed to sleep for an hour before getting up.

I still remember one such episode. We were forced to run to check whether we wrapped footcloths correctly. Out of 30 people, one guy had blood all over his leg. When he took off his boots, it was a very terrible phenomenon.

And one guy just got fired. I don't know how he did it, but the fact remains. The fact is that he could not march in the ranks with everyone. They gave the commands "Left", "Left" ..., but he kept lifting the wrong leg all the time. This is what I remember. But maybe he still had some deviations. This I no longer know. But he was commissioned. And can you imagine? What was my condition. You just had to think that the person was going HOME!!! And I have to go through the whole 730 days in boots.

Then a week later we were sent to battalion 51560 (Almazovo). Where I took the oath and completely passed the Young Fighter Course. That's another story. To be continued.

I can write to

Chapter three. BAM - construction of the century

A bright page in the annals of the Railway Troops is the history of the construction of the Baikal-Amur Railway.

In July 1974, the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted Decree No. 561 on the construction of the Baikal-Amur Railway. The word "BAM" came into life rapidly and firmly established itself in it. Millions of people looked at geographical maps with interest in order to connect Baikal and Amur with their mind's eye. I was struck by the vast expanses of the region, the grandiose scope of the upcoming construction.

The main line crossed an extremely complex natural region, most of it passed in the mountains, and the central section - in a zone of high seismicity, met with such full-flowing rivers as the Lena, Upper Angara, Olekma, Gilyui, Selemdzha, Byssa, Bureya, Amgun, Amur, passed over vast areas of permafrost. In these northern regions, where the earth is shrouded in 50-60-degree frosts, there were almost no roads, not even trails. The rare Evenk settlements that found shelter along the banks of the rivers were separated from each other by many kilometers of taiga.

The new building put forward the most complex scientific and technical problems associated with the construction of a huge number of bridges, tunnels, viaducts, culverts. To lay 3,145 km of track, it was necessary to build 3,200 artificial structures, carry out over 300 million cubic meters of earthwork, and dig 27 km of tunnels in the mountains.

In terms of the volume of construction work, the variety of engineering structures, and the courage of engineering and technical thought, BAM was a unique phenomenon, it had no equal in the world history of railway construction. No wonder this construction site was called the construction site of the century. The Soviet government entrusted the construction of the eastern part of the BAM - from Tynda to Komsomolsk-on-Amur - to the Railway Troops.

There were many difficult tasks, their solution did not tolerate delays. To start work at BAM, it was necessary to quickly relocate a number of formations and units to the construction site and develop technical documentation, reconnoiter the route, solve the issues of supplying it with equipment, building materials, housing and food.

The Main Directorate of the Railway Troops developed a special plan for the development of work on the Eastern section of the BAM, a directive construction schedule was drawn up, which reflected the entire production complex. It was calculated taking into account the use of advanced construction technology, progressive materials and structures, and the latest domestic technology.

The equipment of the formations with equipment was provided both from the reserve available in the troops and from the funds of the Ministry of Transport and Construction. The units were replenished with equipment and property of the nomenclature of the Ministry of Defense from the military districts.

Due to the lack of specialists in all the professions required in construction, by order of the Minister of Defense, military organizations and units were allowed to attract a certain number of qualified civilian specialists as instructors, as well as to repair equipment, perform emergency work in industrial and civil construction.

In the first months after the issuance of Decree No. 561, organizational measures were taken. In particular, a special plan was developed. One of the first important measures of the plan included the development of a directive construction schedule. Exceptionally great attention was paid to the development and control of the execution of the directive schedule in the troops. Suffice it to say that the schedule was personally signed by the head of the Railway Troops, Colonel General A. M. Kryukov, agreed by the Deputy Minister of Defense Marshal of the Soviet Union S. K. Kurkotkin, Minister of Railways B. P. Beshchev and approved by the Minister of Transport Construction I. D. Sosnov. Experienced engineers V. A. Shemuratov, A. K. Sakun, N. V. Novichkov, and A. S. Butenko contributed a lot of work and creativity to the development of the directive schedule.

In parallel with the development of the schedule, engineers V. A. Vasiliev, E. O. Zheltov, K. P. Petrov, V. N. Vdovin and others specified the complexes of machines and mechanisms necessary for work in conditions of low temperatures and permafrost, V. P Sukhodolsky, I. I. Soluyan, and B. A. Andreev were looking for sources to cover material resources.

According to calculations, 8 reinforced railway brigades and two bridge regiments were required to carry out the work.

The management of the construction of the Eastern section of the BAM was carried out by the Main Directorate of the Railway Troops (GUZhV), located in Moscow, through the management of the buildings located in the construction area: in the city of Tynda and the town. Chegdomyn. To increase the efficiency of command and control within the GUZhV, in 1978 the Directorate for the Construction of the BAM and Eastern Railways was created, which was entrusted with solving major issues related to the construction of the BAM. It supervised the progress and quality of construction. The Directorate was headed by Generals G. I. Kupriyanov, V. T. Volobuev, their deputies were engineers V. A. Shemuratov, N. F. Ustinov, A. K. Sakun.

In connection with the increasing volume of work on the construction of industrial and civil facilities and the lack of appropriate specialists in the states of the troops, in July 1980 the Urgalbamtransstroy general construction trust was formed, subordinate directly to the head of the Railway Troops.

The functions of the customer were performed by the BAM Construction Directorate, which is operationally subordinate to the BAM Construction Directorate as part of the TsUKS MPS. Acquisition of facilities with engineering and technological equipment was carried out by the Transkomplekt Department of the Ministry of Railways.

The functions of general contractors were assigned to the administrations of the buildings. The direct organization of work was carried out by the brigade departments, battalions subordinate to them, as well as bridge regiments in the areas and objects assigned to them. General contractors at their sites, stations and near-station settlements carried out their own arrangement, clearing the route, built road roads with artificial structures on them, erected a subgrade, bridges, viaducts, pipes, retaining walls, the upper structure of the track, carried out general construction work on the device temporary and capital communication lines, power supply up to 35 kW, erected service buildings, structures and devices with engineering networks at all separate points.

With the organization of the Urgalbamtransstroy trust, it was given the functions of a general contractor for the construction of large service and technical buildings and structures (locomotive and car depots, PTO, etc.), heat and water supply facilities, sewerage and the construction of individual villages.

During the years of maximum load, the trust consisted of ten linear construction and installation organizations and several service departments.

Specialized work and installation of technological equipment were carried out by subcontractors of the USSR Ministry of Transport and Construction and other ministries and departments.

The bridge crews No. 43, 51 and 70 of the Glavmostostroy built large bridges and viaducts. Two mechanized columns of the trust "Bamstroymekhanizatsiya" erected a subgrade in separate sections.

SU-495 of the trust "Transhydromekhanizatsiya" completed the alluvium of the subgrade at the station. Urgal-II, the development of a canal for the diversion of the Urgal river bed, the alluvium of the earthworks of the approaches to the bridges across the Selemdzha and Byssa, the station site at the station. February.

Vodrem-76 of the trust "Bamtransstroy" mounted internal plumbing and electrical work in residential and service buildings.

The Glavtranselectromontazh train laid and installed trunk and local communication lines, automatic blocking devices, suspended wires for power lines and installed equipment, cable work and installed power supply equipment.

From time to time, as a rule, during the years when sites were put into permanent operation, the organizations of Daltransstroy, Dalenergomontazh, Dalsantekhmontazh, Soyuzliftmontazh, Soyuzspetsavtomatika, Vostoksibspetsavtomatika, Minrechflot, East Siberian, Baikal-Amur Railways were involved in the installation and commissioning work on the installation of boiler houses and other complex facilities , trusts of Transtechmontazh, Minmontazhspetsstroy, etc.

Great help to the railroad soldiers - the builders of the Eastern section of the BAM, was constantly provided by two specially created helicopter detachments. As part of the associations of the Railway Troops, the formations and units listed in the table acted:

The structure of a separate railway brigade in different years of the construction of BAM included from 12 to 22 separate battalions and service units and organizations.

As the tasks were completed, some formations and units were disbanded, others went to new construction sites, and the necessary forces and means were left for completion.

BAM has become a nationwide construction site. On its Eastern section, the construction of housing and socio-cultural facilities, station complexes, engineering facilities (settlement boiler houses, water intake and treatment facilities) in the order of providing patronage assistance was carried out by construction and installation organizations:

Marevaya - Tula region;

Dipkun and Tutaul - Moscow region;

Zeysk - Bashkir ASSR;

Izhak - Ulyanovsk region;

Tungala and Postyshevo - Novosibirsk region;

Dugda and Alonka - Moldavian SSR;

Fevralsk - Krasnoyarsk Territory and the trust "Urgalbamtransstroy";

Fedkin Klyuch and Herbi - Saratov region;

Etyrken - Kuibyshev region;

Urgal - Ukrainian SSR;

Soloni - Tajik SSR;

Suluk - Khabarovsk Territory;

Dzhamka - Volgograd region;

Amgun - Penza region;

Evoron - Altai Territory;

Khurmuli - Tambov region.

The village of Gorin was built on its own - SMP-650 of the Urgalbamtransstroy trust.

The settlements, residential, cultural, community and social facilities in them were designed by the institutes of the sponsoring regions, territories and union republics, and the service and technical buildings and structures of the stations, the main networks of heat and water supply, sewerage, electricity, engineering facilities (boiler rooms, treatment plants and water intake facilities), as well as production facilities in settlements (vegetable stores, ORS bases, etc.) - general designers and institutes Mosgiprotrans, Dalgiprotrans, Kievgiprotrans (Urgal settlement and station).

Contractual relationships with patronage organizations were carried out in accordance with the regulation on the relationship of organizations - general contractors (corps departments) with subcontracting organizations (chiefs). At the same time, the general contractors provided the patronage organizations with all material resources and leased out the main construction machines and vehicles to them according to the calculation for the accepted annual volumes of work.

Due to the lack of a sufficient production base in the Far East region for the construction of residential buildings and some social and cultural facilities, a number of patronage organizations supplied reinforced concrete structures, panels, bricks, joinery, and sanitary ware from their enterprises. Delivery of the KPD was carried out by rail on specially equipped platforms.

The names of such leaders of patronage organizations as A. I. Lukyanenko, V. M. Batalov, I. A. Panov, I. F. Zhelobnyuk, V. P. Nefedov, N. Ch. Kozhanov, P. E. Borisov, A. S. Kalashnikov, foreman of carpenters-concrete workers of SMP "Ukrstroy", Hero of Socialist Labor V. I. Konoval and others.

Among the heads of subcontracting organizations, the deputy was especially distinguished by the skillful and conscientious performance of his duty. manager of the united trust "Glavtranselectromontazh" N. T. Kalinin.

The main principle of organizing the construction of the section was to develop work on a broad front, as was the case for the construction of such lines as Abakan - Taishet and Ivdel - Ob. It was planned to attack the taiga to the east and west at the same time, turning such starting points as Tynda, Fevralsk and Urgal into the main bases of builders. The line of the labor front stretched for hundreds of kilometers, the whole country became the rear of the construction. The command and the Military Council of the troops drew up a detailed plan of organizational, technical and political measures to fulfill the assigned tasks. The specific tasks of the units and subunits that were put forward at BAM were planned to be discussed at meetings of party and Komsomol activists, party and Komsomol organizations, at meetings and seminars of commanders and political workers.

At meetings of personnel, short ones, known since the 1930s, were accepted. resolutions: “Give BAM!”, “Work at BAM in the Komsomol way!”, “We will justify the trust of the people!”.

A participant in the Great Patriotic War, retired Major Kondratyev, who celebrated his 60th birthday, at the call of his heart left with his wife for Fevralsk, where he worked in one of the military units, giving his rich experience as a military railway worker to a great construction site. “Having learned about BAM, I lost my peace,” he says. “Now I am happy that together with the youth I am building the highway of the century, multiplying the glorious traditions of our troops. BAM is my second youth.”

Throughout the autumn and winter of 1974, the taiga troops of railroad soldiers fought for bridgeheads. The main task of the initial period was to break through the swamps and rocks to those places where it was planned to create construction strongholds, build housing there, various cultural and community facilities, bring in equipment, building materials, food, i.e. create the necessary conditions for work and rest personnel, families of officers and ensigns. At the same time, work was underway to lay temporary winter roads. All this had to be done in a short time, before the onset of the spring thaw, which would cut off the lead groups from the main bases.

Overcoming innumerable obstacles, units and subunits of the troops, led by experienced military railwaymen F. I. Pribov, A. I. Demin, I. N. Egorushkin, B. A. Shkibtan and others, made a bold breakthrough into the taiga.

One of the detachments of pioneers had to travel more than 40 km through places where a human foot rarely set foot. And not only to pass, but also to carry out equipment: cars, tractors, a sawmill, deliver tents, tools, food supplies there. This detachment was the first and therefore it was prepared with special care. The detachment was headed by an experienced commander, engineer-lieutenant colonel Ya. Parashchenko.

For four days the soldiers marched through the deserted taiga. By the end of the fourth day, a radiogram was received at the headquarters of the unit: “... we are at the 38th kilometer. Tractors are "undressed", KrAZ trucks are bogged down in a quagmire. We make our way on foot ... ".

However, despite any difficulties, the detachment reached the intended target and then withdrew all the equipment, ensuring the completion of the task.

The first group of warriors was followed by the second, the third... No matter how hard the pioneers experienced. More than once they spent the night under the green canopy of the taiga, plunged into ice fonts, froze in a fierce cold, often risked their lives.

Once, during the construction of a temporary road bridge, the unforeseen happened. Due to heavy rains, the water level in the river rose, threatening to overturn the installed supports. In a critical situation, Sergeant N. Shengelia turned to the commander. He proposed to swim to the supports, put cables under them and try to hold the rows with tractors. He was supported by Sergeant V. Kudba, privates N. Filippov and R. Chonkosadze. The commander took the necessary precautions. A few minutes later, the daredevils rushed into the icy water and secured the cables holding the bridge supports.

Another time, when a column of cars was overcoming a river foamed by a flood, one of the cars was turned around by a swift current, it tilted, and water poured into the cab, where Major A. Bezgubenko and driver corporal R. Romazanov were.

Learning that the soldier did not know how to swim, the officer helped him climb onto the roof of the cabin, and he himself, seeing that nothing could be done from the shore, swam to the nearest spit. There, from the fragments of fallen trees, he built a raft and, overcoming the current, risking himself, set off on his way back to save the soldier. He managed to do it.

As always in new buildings, a heavy burden fell on the shoulders of the drivers. The BAM roads became a testing ground for them, where courage and skill were tested. How many times - do not count - they went on long, difficult and far from safe flights.

Cars got stuck in the mud in the summer, and in the winter they got stuck in snowdrifts, fell into the tenacious embrace of ice, drowned in rivers and swamps. And yet they went on. The engines seemed to run not on fuel, but on a fiery mixture of soldier's perseverance and courage. The military driver, junior sergeant A. Gaidashev, made 15 multi-kilometer trips in 3 months, delivering various cargoes into the depths of the taiga. Each such flight lasted 5–7 days. And there were many like Gaidashev.

Courage became the measure of the daily affairs of BAM soldiers. The track gave birth to heroes. But this process did not happen spontaneously. High moral and psychological qualities were formed by active and purposeful educational work, constant influence on the consciousness of every soldier.

In the conditions of the taiga route, life made increased demands on commanders and political workers. The huge scale of construction, the complexity of solving problems, when the deadlines for achieving the goals set were unusually short, and the harsh nature did not give up a single meter of taiga space without a struggle - all this to some extent resembled a front-line situation, where it is especially important to constantly and purposefully carry out educational impact on personnel.

When the forward detachments made their way through the taiga to the strongholds, many problems arose. There was not enough housing, not everywhere there was a cinema, radio (car clubs stuck on temporary roads), the soldiers received newspapers on the fifth day. For hundreds of kilometers around not a single settlement, many units worked in small scattered groups.

Such an episode is well known in the history of BAM. Once in winter, a convoy of motor vehicles delivered an important cargo to a distant point in the taiga. The vehicles were to return to the unit in two days. But they did not arrive on the third day. Alarming news was transmitted from the destination by radio: the convoy did not arrive, where it is located is unknown. The helicopter that tried to take off in search was pressed to the ground by a blizzard.

And in the taiga, nine drivers fought a duel with the raging elements. The ice of the river, along which the winter road passed, cracked, and the vast space was flooded with water. Corporal A. Sychev, who led the convoy, moved along the coast in an off-road vehicle, where the water was not so deep. Private B. Mamatov, who was following him, took a little to the right, and immediately the front wheel of his car fell into a crack. Corporal Sychev, taking the cable, jumped out of the cab. The water reached almost to the waist, but this did not stop the warrior. He hooked a comrade's car with a cable and pulled it to a safe place. Then he also had to tow the rest of the cars.

It got warmer in the evening. Heavy snow began to fall, visibility reduced to zero. It was dangerous to go further: beyond the river, a section began along the slopes of hills covered with ice. On the left is a rock, on the right is an abyss. We decided to spend the night in the taiga. The three-day supply of food, just in case, was divided into 8 days. The ration was poor. Some drivers became disheartened.

They say that a remarkable dialogue took place around the fire. “Saulis,” Corporal Sychev turned to Private Zelenkyavichus, “did you read about the four brave sailors - Ziganshin, Poplavsky, Kryuchkovsky, Fedotov?” “I read it,” he replied. - Forty-nine days in the ocean on a small barge ... No food, no drink. People of great courage." “Could we do that?” “I think we could. Take anyone - Mamatov, Suleimenov, other guys - they won't let you down. Am I right guys?" - "That's right!" The warriors responded in unison. Almost 9 days continued difficult flight. Tractors sent to help the convoy helped to overcome the last kilometers. But no less important role was played here by the commanders, who in word and deed strengthened the courage and determination in the soldiers to carry out the task to the end.

The front of the attack on the taiga expanded. Detachments of patronage organizations began to arrive at the Eastern sector, where railroad soldiers worked. One of the first to arrive were envoys from Ukraine and Moldova. They started construction of Urgal and Alonka stations.

On June 13, 1974, ordinary Komsomol members Aleksey Kravtsov, Vasily Kovbasa and Georgy Evdokimov poured the first cubic meters of soil into the highway road from Tynda to the east, and on February 5, 1975, the first crutch was hammered into the rail link of the main BAM track. This happened at the 2712th kilometer from Ust-Kut. The right to score a crutch was granted to private Leonid Smirnov. The builders placed a large granite cube next to it, assigning it an honorable role - to testify to history the place of the first BAM crutch, to become a monument for posterity.

In the central section, railroad soldiers, together with the builders of the Ministry of Transport Construction, at an accelerated pace, were laying the track on the BAM-Tynda line, connecting the construction site of the century with the Trans-Siberian Railway. Despite the abundance of rivers, it was difficult to get water on the highway. In autumn, it was taken from afar in tank trucks. With the onset of cold weather, this possibility disappeared: the water in the containers quickly froze. On clean taiga rivers, ice began to be broken, transported to towns and melted. At the same time they were looking for groundwater. The work was not easy. Sometimes it was necessary to drill wells to a depth of 200 m. Life forced us to solve another problem - the preservation of the environment. This approach to the activities of builders required the reasonable use of local natural resources, the creation of complex treatment facilities, and the implementation of various technical measures that preserve nature. Warriors-BAMOs solved this problem in a businesslike way.

The wide front of the attack on the taiga sharply raised the question of managing the construction site, which stretched for hundreds of kilometers, before the command of the Railway Troops. In this regard, the structure of the administrative apparatus was restructured, the political department was transformed into a political department. A special operational group was created in the Main Directorate of the Railway Troops, which dealt exclusively with BAM issues.

A lot of effort required communication between departments - the first step of management. Communication with distant detachments was carried out by radio and telephone. There were also problems: wires were torn from wind and frost, supports fell under the onslaught of strong floods. Sometimes I had to resort to special couriers, send written instructions by helicopter. In general, the signalmen of the troops provided communication clearly.

The panorama of the construction site changed every month. The age-old taiga came to life. The subgrade was being poured out, track links were being laid, canteens, bakeries, clubs, and libraries appeared in the builders' towns. All this cost a lot of effort. Permafrost was not inferior in hardness to metal. In winter, from severe frosts, grease froze, metal crumbled. In the excavator buckets, the teeth broke, the cables were torn. Punched from the quarries to the embankment under construction, the roads were covered with ice. There were cases when a truck accidentally left on the road was covered with ice one night up to the cabin itself, and in the spring the cars fell into the swamps.

Wetlands annoyed the builders not only as an obstacle to the movement of vehicles. They showed special deceit when earthworks were unfolding on them. The first spring at BAM taught a memorable lesson: the gauze swallowed up entire sections of the already laid road. This happened where the moss cover was broken. The exposed permafrost melted under the spring sun, and hundreds of cubic meters of soil disappeared. Since then, the dumping of embankments along mariahs has been carried out directly on the vegetation layer.

Despite the difficulties, the railroad soldiers showed examples of selfless labor. Teams led by officers A. Zheleznov, I. Bosy, K. Kurochkin, P. Tsygankov, M. Gafurov, A. Komarov, A. Savitsky, E. Zhadyaev, V. Vladimirsky, G. Agapychev worked with overfulfillment of tasks. The company, commanded by senior lieutenant A. Pirozhenko, was on one of the difficult sections of the route, but systematically completed monthly tasks by 120%. The work of an advanced officer was awarded the Order "For Service to the Motherland in the Armed Forces of the USSR" III degree.

Two norms per shift on heavy soils, in January frosts, excavator sergeants S. Lopaev, T. Akimkanov, privates A. Kuznetsov, V. Sorokaletov, S. Buralev, L. Chaika, B. Novikov, A. Samotkanov and many others performed .

The socialist competition of BAM soldiers for a worthy meeting of the 30th anniversary of the Victory was expanding. It was initiated by the personnel of the bridge battalion, commanded by Captain L. Svetlov. The bridge workers gave their word to complete the annual task ahead of schedule, to put into operation only objects with good and excellent quality.

The initiative in the Eastern sector found universal support. In difficult conditions, many mechanized complexes, crews, teams performed one and a half or two norms per shift, the soldiers competently exploited complex construction equipment. Captain N. Shcheglov, Lieutenant V. Oleinik, Sergeant V. Karpov, Private D. Shashkov, and others were called right-flank competitions. Among the track-layers, the unit commanded by Senior Lieutenant V. Kazhdan held the championship in the competition. Selflessness in work, perseverance, determination became commonplace for the pioneers. No vagaries of wild nature could stop the offensive impulse of the railroad warriors. An example of this is the construction of a 622-meter bridge across the Bureya River.

On January 2, 1975, the team of Komsomol member Sergeant A. Vikulov drove the first pile under the bridge supports. Construction has begun. It was short in time, but extremely stressful. To imagine what difficulties the conquest of the Storm cost, suffice it to say that the bridgemen hammered the first test pile for 4 days. Two thousand times the copra hammer took off and fell, and the pile deepened only 20 centimeters. Permafrost and rock layers, ice and 50-degree frosts resisted man.

But the soldiers steadfastly endured hardships. The fuel for pile-driving units turned into ice, steel bolts broke in the cold, but the bridge-builders did not give up. Special non-freezing fuel began to be used on copra. A smithy and a sawmill were installed right on the ice, and there was no need to travel far for metal parts and timber for rags and ice cutters. An example in labor, as always, was shown by the commanders. Officers L. Svetlov, B. Berezny, G. Anikin, A. Tsvetaev, V. Semochkin, A. Vashchenko and many others sometimes did not leave the bridge for days, inspiring and mobilizing the soldiers with their stamina and diligence. When there was a delay in the installation of supports, the most experienced, most strong-willed specialists were sent to carry out this operation. In the decision adopted at the party meeting, it was written: not a single communist has the right to work with marriage, to pass by shortcomings. Lost time has been made up.

On April 15, a few days before the spring flood, the last span was laid on the bridge. A huge complex structure, for which it was necessary to put 18 supports, 10 ice cutters, lay about 600 thousand cubic meters of rocky soil, was erected in a record short time - a little more than 3 months. All standards were exceeded. Cargo to the head sections went over the bridge ahead of schedule.

The history of the bridge, however, did not end there. In the same year, there was a hot summer that melted the ice on the tops of the mountains, and then the exhausting heat gave way to warm showers. The rivers burst their banks. At Bureya, the water level rose by 9 m. Even the old-timers of these places did not remember this. The flood flooded the settlements and camps of prospectors, riverside fields and roads. Many construction sites are under threat.

The situation at the bridge was the most disturbing. The river swallowed high ice cutters, cut off the bridge from the banks, formed a huge traffic jam of fallen trees and snags. This raised the water level even higher. When night fell, the gap between the lower part of the spans and the surface of the water was a little over 40 cm. The bridge shuddered from the monstrous pressure and could collapse into the river at any moment.

The battalion, commanded by Major L. Svetlov, was built on alert. The commander announced that a detachment was being created to save the bridge, which would be parachuted from helicopters. It's not safe, we need volunteers. Everyone volunteered to go. Selected the strongest, most enduring.

Warriors worked all night by the light of searchlights. Sergeants N. Vinilov, N. Nesterov, privates A. Artemiev, E. Sakhbaev, V. Pozdeev, I. Martushenko and their comrades pushed driftwood under the spans, even pulled trees onto the bridge and threw them to the other side. Standing on supports, above the rapidly sweeping black water, feeling the shuddering body of the bridge, the twenty-year-old warriors did not get lost, did not succumb to a sense of fear.

When a traffic jam began to grow at one of the pillars, Lieutenant E. Suprun descended from the bridge onto a pile of logs. He fastened the ends of the ropes to the thickest trunks, and the soldiers pulled the logs out of the water and threw them over the bridge. The congestion has been cleared. For days without sleep and rest, an unusual landing force fought for the bridge and defended it.

The year 1975 is remembered by the builders of the highway as the first great labor feat. May 9 - on the day of the 30th anniversary of the Victory of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War, the connecting line BAM - Tynda was put into operation with a length of 180 km, the same one from which the rails were removed to achieve victory over the enemy during the war years. The new generation "repaid the debt" to the people. The winners of the socialist competition got the right to lay the last, "silver" link in Tynda. Among them are Captain E. Zakharov, Senior Lieutenant P. Rusakov, Corporal V. Osipenko and V. Shifer, Private V. Erokhin. On the same day, the first working train arrived on the connecting line to the capital of BAM - Tynda. He delivered prefabricated houses, building materials, equipment.

The first BAM year was marked by great labor successes. In a short time, in harsh natural and climatic conditions, teams of builders were created, capable of rapidly building a giant steel line. BAM warriors planned high milestones for themselves. The main one was to close the so-called Far Eastern railway ring already in 1979, a year ahead of schedule, to provide the northernmost outlet to the ocean. To close it from the north, it was necessary to connect Urgal and Komsomolsk-on-Amur with a steel thread - this is more than 500 km of the route. It was them who undertook to build the soldiers-railroad workers.

The site turned out to be a hard nut to crack: dozens of large and small rivers, ridges, hills, swamps. The road bed had to be built on narrow coastal shelves - clamps. Rocky soils were not inferior in strength to metal. It was necessary to build bridges one another more difficult. And finally, as the final chord of difficulties, the Dusse-Alin tunnel.

The almost two-kilometer underground corridor famous here was cut into the rocks and permafrost back in the pre-war years. But it so happened that the tunnel was not in operation at that time: the construction of the line was mothballed. Time did not spare the unique structure. Drainage devices fell into disrepair, viewing wells covered with rock “blinded”. For decades, groundwater and severe Siberian cold have been destructive. Leaking into the tunnel, the water moved irresistibly down the slope from the eastern portal to the western one and froze, forming ice, which, in the end, almost completely blocked the tunnel with all its auxiliary devices: adits, slots, trays. 32 thousand cubic meters of ice! The railroad soldiers had to clear the tunnel of ice and lay rails in it.

But for this, a lot of effort had to be expended on the approaches to Dusse-Alin. The route here passed along steep slopes, through huge monolithic rocks. To blow them up, the explosives did a job of incredible complexity and precision. On slopes with a steepness of up to 60 °, the soldiers of the unit, led by officer I. I. Romankov, raised drilling rigs and explosives to a height of up to 50 m and began to drill deep wells. On one of the winter days, when the air temperature was at around -40 ° C, the explosives of Senior Lieutenant V. Malanichev had to make another explosion of the rock. To do this, it was necessary to lay a multi-ton charge in the wells. The car with explosives was late due to snowfall and slippery roads. When she arrived, there were only a few hours left before dark, and it was possible to blow up only during daylight hours. The soldiers, climbing the icy steeps, carried explosive materials on their hands to the wells. It was faster and more reliable that way. The explosion happened at the appointed time. The perseverance of the soldiers and officers won - the rock was crushed.

In the very first days of work on the revival of the Dusse-Alin tunnel, it became clear that the implementation of the project, which included the development of ice with jackhammers and its transportation by trolleys, would take too much time (about a year) and require large material costs. Then the military engineers Zh. Isahakyan, A. Kovalchuk and G. Groshev proposed their original method: to melt the ice in the tunnel with warm air. Experienced specialists — miners of the Khabarovsk Territory — were involved in performing technical calculations, providing the necessary equipment, and in the practical implementation of the task.

In summer, among the snow-covered spurs of the Dusse-Alin ridge, the first explosions were heard. The ice mountain that blocked the path to the entrance to the tunnel was destroyed. Then two powerful fans and two heat generators came into action. Warm air rushed into the depths of the tunnel through long sleeves laid in a narrow crack near the roof of the tunnel. The heat melted the top layer of ice, while the bottom layer was simultaneously developed mechanically. Streams flowed from the tunnel. On the first day, about 300 cubic meters of ice were melted.

But it soon turned out that the ice was not melting in the entire tunnel: somewhere in the depths there was a cork that tightly clogged the underground corridor. They decided to eliminate her.

Armed with jackhammers, a group of soldiers led by junior sergeant N. Mariychenko began to make their way through a narrow hole. It was very difficult to walk. Sometimes I had to crawl. The lack of oxygen affected, counter flows of water interfered. But the soldiers persistently went to the goal. Finally, in the beam of an electric lantern, a block of solid ice lit up, blocking the tunnel. Jackhammers were launched. An unexpectedly powerful stream of water, breaking through the hole, knocked the sergeant off his feet. It was water that had accumulated in the other half of the tunnel. The plug was removed, and warm air rushed into the gap.

Day and night, at the entrance to the Dusse-Alin tunnel, motors hummed, searchlights burned. The railroad warriors tried to finish clearing the tunnel before the onset of cold weather. Particular emphasis was placed on the reconstruction of drainage structures, which were supposed to prevent the formation of ice in the future. The tunnel was cleared of ice 4 times faster than originally planned. The railroad workers got to work. The subordinates of officer V. Nesterenko pulled the rails through the tunnel in two days.

The first years of work under BAM conditions gave a number of interesting engineering solutions, especially on bridges, the construction of which became a good school of bridge building for military specialists. After careful calculations and comparisons, it was decided to focus on two types of bridge projects: post-trestle bridges and bridges with cladding block supports. Such blocks did not require a preliminary arrangement of labor-intensive formwork, and greatly simplified the process of constructing supports. However, the foundations of such supports required a lot of monolithic concrete and were built on a natural or pile foundation. The search continued. The choice of bridge specialists was based on the project of artificial structures, in which columnar supports and foundations were used. In permafrost conditions, the use of reinforced concrete pillars turned out to be a very progressive matter. Columnar foundations made it possible to reduce the laboriousness of excavation of deep pits in permafrost soils many times over.

The problems encountered during the implementation of these innovations were successfully solved. The assault on the taiga continued at an increasing pace. The everyday work of the soldiers gave rise to interesting initiatives, was distinguished by creativity and inspiration. Such slogans as "For two years of service - three annual norms!", "Annual directive norm - ahead of schedule!", became the slogans of the struggle of personnel for the highest labor productivity, efficiency and quality of work. At the initiative of the Komsomol organization of the unit, commanded by Lieutenant E. Zuev, a quality mark was established at the link assembly base - two stars on the rails of a perfectly stitched link. These signs can be found on many kilometers of the BAM, they are a guarantee of the reliability and durability of the BAM route.

In 1976, the Komsomol conferences of the units of the Railway Troops at BAM were held. They summed up the activities of Komsomol organizations and outlined new frontiers. These lines have been taken.

In February 1977, the first rally of soldiers of the Railway Troops took place in Khabarovsk, the leaders of socialist competition, the builders of the Eastern section of the Baikal-Amur Mainline. The best of the best came to the meeting. The names of the right-flank competitions were announced from the podium - the commander of the bridge battalion, Major V. Bondarevsky, the company commander, laureate of the Lenin Komsomol Prize, Lieutenant A. Kuznetsov, the best track-laying machinist corporal V. Sheptalo, the noble excavator corporal V. Snigur and many others.

The participants of the rally adopted an appeal in which they called on the BAM soldiers to take a shock watch, achieve new high levels in combat and political training, and launch a competition for the early completion of the construction of the eastern part of the BAM. Work was intensively carried out on the Far Eastern Ring. Each kilometer of the route was given with great difficulty. Sometimes weeks were spent on overcoming the next 100 m. Each working day put forward new tasks and new problems that needed to be addressed immediately.

The mechanization unit, led by officer G. Korotkov, worked around the clock. One and a half to two norms per shift were performed by excavator corporal V. Snigur, privates P. Chertok, S. Nikulin, S. Konyushevsky, dump truck driver Private V. Kondrashov, workers L. Frantsuzov, brothers Nikolai and Valentin Bezruchkin. Bulldozer operators Kalantyrsky achieved high productivity: the father is a hereditary transport builder and the son is an ordinary Railway Troops.

The calculations of the tracklayers worked hard. The division of Captain V. Kazhdan, which laid the first link of the Eastern section, led the laying of the track under the motto "For every kilometer of BAM - high quality and a soldier's guarantee!". The travel warriors were well ahead of schedule. Among them, a competition for the right to lay the "Zaslonovsky kilometer" unfolded. This movement was born after a letter sent to the soldiers by the pioneers of the city of Vyazemsky, Khabarovsk Territory. The guys reported that their squad was named after the legendary partisan hero Konstantin Zaslonov, who worked at the Vyazemsky depot before the war. Together with the Komsomol members, the pioneers collected 100 tons of scrap metal for the BAM rails and asked the railroad soldiers to lay a kilometer of track on the highway in honor of the commander of the partisan detachment Zaslonov. The warriors warmly responded to the request of the pioneers. "Zaslonovsky kilometer" was laid. The winners of the competition, the soldiers of the platoon of Lieutenant V. Lukyanov, whose father, Fyodor Zinovievich Lukyanov, fought against the Nazis in a partisan detachment commanded by Konstantin Zaslonov, got the right to do this.

Bridgemen creatively solved complex problems. They introduced many innovations into production in order to speed up the construction of bridges, reduce their cost and increase the reliability factor. So, during the construction of bridges across the Right and Left Orokot, the bridgemen successfully replaced massive monolithic supports with column foundations that were not inferior to them in strength. As a result, hundreds of cubic meters of concrete were saved and time was gained. In the struggle to gain time, railroad warriors showed real selflessness and heroism. On the construction of one of the bridges of the Eastern section of BAM, such an incident occurred. When driving a well under a support, a rocky layer stood in the way of the drilling rig. They decided to crush it by throwing a pointed steel projectile down through a special so-called casing pipe. Suddenly, the cable burst, and the one and a half ton bulk sat down at an eight-meter depth, firmly clogging the well. Work on the bridge has stopped.

While they were thinking how to get out of a difficult situation, water filled the well almost to the top. The pumps started up and the water level began to drop. At this time, the driver of the power plant, Corporal Viktor Akimov, turned to the commander. He volunteered to go down the pipe and hook the projectile with a cable.

Having tied himself with a safety rope and grabbing a cable with a hook at the end, Corporal Akimov began to descend into impenetrable darkness. The diameter of the pipe was about a meter, only a small circle of sky shone overhead. Resting his arms and legs against the walls of the pipe, the warrior sank lower and lower. At the bottom was icy water infused with permafrost, it reached the waist. Cold, like a vise, squeezed the body. Akimov felt the neck of the projectile with his foot and threw a loop of rope over it. He pulled the rope to be dragged. The cable was taut, but the loop slipped off the neck. With fingers numb from the cold, Akimov made another attempt. And the water already reached the chest. Now you can’t just put on the rope so easily - you have to dive. And Akimov dived. But again the noose slipped. Several times the warrior dived into the icy water. In the end, he managed to hook the projectile, and the drilling rig started working again. The letter, which was soon sent by the commander to the Volgograd region, was written: "Thank you, Varvara Grigoryevna, for raising such a son, a faithful comrade, a courageous soldier."

The road kept going east. Units under the command of V. Nesterov approached the Dipkun station, which is located 165 km east of Tynda, laying the track. Rail links also approached Vosporukhan, the most remote taiga village in the Eastern section. And on June 30, 1979 - a year ahead of schedule - the Far Eastern railway ring was closed. The first train left Urgal for Komsomolsk-on-Amur along the 500-kilometer section built by soldiers.

Tickets for this train were not sold. They were handed over the day before to those who won the socialist competition, who skillfully managed the huge construction. Among them are construction managers A. K. Volkov, A. I. Demin, V. T. Volobuev, Yu. V. Tertyshny, L. A. Smirnov, advanced officers A. G. Komarov, K. D. Kurochkin, A V. Rotshtein, I. F. Uretsky, A. V. Radchuk, G. M. Korotkov, V. M. Each, warriors-machine operators V. Snigur, Yu. Philip, V. Ryazhev, M. Vladimirov, I. Peskishev, A. Bakiyev, M. Tausov and others.

The difficult labor battle lasted for four years and four months. An important milestone has been taken. A solemn meeting was held at the Urkaltu junction. A 10-meter monument was erected here in the form of a “silver” crutch connecting two concrete rails - a symbol-monument to the selfless work of railway soldiers in the Eastern sector.

On September 9, 1980, the second meeting of the leaders of the socialist competition of the Eastern section of the Baikal-Amur Mainline took place. Among the best at the rally, they named the mechanization battalion of Lieutenant Colonel V. Kupriyanov, the excellent company of the laureate of the Lenin Komsomol Prize, Senior Lieutenant E. Almazov, the platoon of Lieutenant A. Pigur, and the names of many other soldiers.

In 1974, railroad soldiers hammered in the first pegs on the BAM track. At the beginning of 1975, the first meters of rails were laid. In 1980, a 200-kilometer section of the main route was put into operation - from Postyshevo to Komsomolsk-on-Amur, and two years later - a 302-kilometer section from Urgal to Postyshevo. All these kilometers were commissioned ahead of schedule. The building was changing and growing every day.

At the beginning of 1983, calculations showed that if the pace of work at the BAM was accelerated even more, then by the spring of 1984, i.e., a year and a half ahead of schedule, the units moving towards each other would be able to dock the rails of the entire Eastern BAM. January and February 1983 passed in disputes, calculations, estimates. The idea of ​​laying rails ahead of schedule throughout the Eastern Section infected everyone. “Give docking ahead of schedule!” The Military Council of the Troops approved and supported the initiative of the advanced BAM teams. The task was difficult. In order to successfully solve it and on the eve of the 39th anniversary of the Victory of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War, to let the first train pass through the Eastern section of the BAM, it was necessary to carry out a huge amount of construction. Here are the most important figures characterizing the size of the forthcoming work: to fill the soil - 15.4 million cubic meters, to lay the railway track - 270 km, to build 177 bridges. Not a single annual program of the Railway Troops at BAM knew such figures.

What did it mean to ensure the docking of the rails of the Eastern section of BAM at the siding named after V.P. Miroshnichenko? First of all, this meant mastering almost 300 km of taiga space in terms of construction. I had to recall the experience of the first months of the development of the BAM zone. Landing forces left the habitable places, from the equipped residential towns to the taiga. The battalion, in which Major S. Shkrabov was deputy commander for political affairs, landed in the taiga in February. In a short time, tents were set up, log houses, a canteen, a bakery, a club, and a vegetable store were built. Erecting living quarters, landscaping the taiga town, the battalion command did not forget about the main thing. From the first day, the platoons, commanded by lieutenants A. Smolyakov, V. Ryzhov, S. Vasiliev, began the main work. They began to cut a clearing. Behind them, warriors-machine operators and warriors of bridge divisions moved forward. They had their own tasks, and they hurried to their objects, did not want to lose a single hour, not a single working minute. And so it was throughout the area. The landing forces, and behind them the main forces of the builders, went towards each other - one to the east of Tynda, the other - to the west of Fevralsk.

The first victory of the railroad warriors, who made their way through the taiga, was the docking of the highway road between Tynda and Urgal. This happened on September 27, 1983 near the Kamnega junction. Warriors-machine operators of the units, commanded by majors V. Galka and A. Sivak, cut through clearings, built bridges, leveled the terrain, and filled swampy areas. They completed their task ahead of schedule. Many barrier places were overcome by railroad warriors during the years of construction of the Baikal-Amur Mainline. We met such a place on the last section of the Eastern shoulder of the BAM. It was Ulagirskaya Sopka, blocking forward movement with a solid rocky wall. In order for the units of railroad soldiers to break out into the operational space, to deploy work on a wide front, it was necessary to cut a one and a half kilometer recess in the hill. It looked more like an open tunnel, since its lower mark dropped to 18 m. The task was difficult and very laborious. The question arose: to whom to entrust an unusual recess? The choice fell on the mechanization battalion, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel V. A. Kurkin. Previously, his mechbat successfully coped with another difficult excavation, proved himself excellently in earthworks on haze areas near Izhak station, and had the necessary experience in overcoming taiga barrier places.

Mehbat with all its technical power fell on the hill. The battle was not easy. Soil - the ninth category of hardness. Sometimes, in order to develop 5-6 thousand cubic meters, it was necessary to spend up to 4 tons of explosives. The recess was also famous for its ice. Warriors-machine operators had to develop about 300 thousand cubic meters of ice. Battalion commander V. A. Kurkin and his deputy for political affairs, Major P. P. Kalin, were at the forefront of the battle all the time, helping their subordinates. Leadership in the socialist competition was won by the companies of captains V. Shevchuk and E. Almazov. All the machine operators worked hard, but the excavator driver Junior Sergeant N. Yakovlev, bulldozer operators A. Ragimov and S. Beluga were named the best of the best. The military team, headed by Colonel G. I. Kogatko, worked together and energetically. The share of machine operators, bridgemen, railway workers, led by Grigory Iosifovich Kogatko, fell to a significant part of the work related to dumping the last thousand cubic meters of land, building artificial structures, laying the final links of the BAM track.

To match Colonel G. I. Kogatko worked at the last stage of laying the steel rails of the eastern BAM and his subordinates - officers Yu. A. Larin, I. Ya. Shekhtman, A. N. Dedov, N. N. Ivashko, unit commanders A. Platonov, S. Zakharov, V. Pavlenko, sergeants G. Metreveli, V. Abramov, V. Filinov, privates K. Gushchin, A. Khubiev, I. Sazhin, O. Kanoganov, workers of the Soviet army V. P. Trush, V Baranov, N. Fomicheva, L. Vogodina and many others.

The battle for the early laying of the last BAM rails unfolded along the entire highway. The front of the labor battle was a huge territory. Dozens and hundreds of teams of builders worked in unison, striving to fulfill their obligations with honor. In the forefront of the competitors, showing labor prowess and selflessness, there were soldiers-railroad workers.

The spring days of 1984 passed one after another. The construction site, which lived in docking time, changed by leaps and bounds. On the eastern section of the BAM, railroad soldiers, laying the track from the east and from the west to the siding named after V.P. Miroshnichenko, counted days, meters, cubic meters. Competition for the right to lay the final rail link, pour the last cubic meter of soil, throw the truss of the last BAM bridge across the river began in all divisions.

By mid-April, the distance between the track-laying teams going towards each other was 12 km. It was time to think about the "gold" link. They decided to make it at the Fevralsk station. Here, railroad soldiers launched socialist competition under the motto of the "Golden" link - days of shock work! And the soldiers worked really hard. From the conveyor of the semi-automatic flow link assembly line, 700 m of track descended daily.

The honorable task of making the "golden" link was entrusted to a team of railway workers headed by Senior Lieutenant S. Kurylenko. The sewing of the link took place in a solemn atmosphere. Dozens of people watched the dexterous and dexterous movements of the railwaymen. The link is ready. He was assigned the serial number 55280. A few days later, the link was sent to the passing point named after V.P. Miroshnichenko, where it was supposed to tie together the entire Eastern shoulder of the highway.

The railroad workers, bridgemen, machine operators, and operators worked heroically on the last BAM hauls. Soldiers-creators decorated the distant land with built bridges, stations, strands of steel rails. The warriors of the steel highways had to not only build, but also selflessly defend what was built.

Heavy rains, which lasted for several days in a row, turned the BAM rivers and streams into turbulent streams - a formidable force. The raging element uprooted trees, easily rolled boulders, washed away small bridges along the highway. On the site, which was covered by the subordinates of Lieutenant Colonel V. Kozlovsky, instead of the bridge demolished by water, the railroad soldiers built a pontoon crossing. To maintain the crossing in working condition, a team of 5 people was left. One day at the end of the day, the downpour burst with renewed vigor. The pontoons shook under the powerful pressure of the river. Private Sergei Martynov, who was on duty at the crossing, ran into the trailer, where his comrades settled down for the night. "Guys, the bridge is in danger!" he shouted.

Everyone rushed to the pontoons. Private Oleg Apetenok was the first to run to the crossing. He had an ax in his hands. Skillfully wielding it, he cut off the long branches of larch, which held a huge jam at the pontoon from uprooted trees, logs, twigs. The traffic jam began to weaken, the trees slowly went under the water. The danger to the crossing was over. And at that moment, the irreparable happened: the larch, picked up by a strong current, turned over, a huge rhizome fell on the soldier with all its weight and carried him into the whirlpool ... Private Oleg Apetyonok died heroically while doing his military duty. By decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR, he was posthumously awarded the Order of the Red Star.

In the days of April 1984, every morning on the BAM maps and diagrams, two red flags moved closer and closer to each other. They marked the movement of track-laying teams to the siding named after V.P. Miroshnichenko. The right to complete the laying of the last kilometers of rails and dock them was given to the units of Captain I. Savchenko and Senior Lieutenant V. Lagushkin from the traveling battalions of Lieutenant Colonel A. Dedov and Major F. Bulychev. The subordinates of I. Savchenko went from Fevralsk, and the railroad workers of V. Lagushkin - from Tynda. The choice of these divisions was not accidental. Warriors from the company of Captain I. Savchenko in 1983 laid 116 km of rails with one tracklayer. It was a great achievement. The company of senior lieutenant V. Lagushkin laid steel rails across the difficult Ulagirskaya hill in record time, successfully completing a responsible task.

April 16, 1984 at the junction named after the Hero of the Soviet Union V.P. Miroshnichenko two tracklayers met. In order to close the steel thread of the highway, it remained to lay the last rail link. What happened to which 10 years through the rocks and ice, swamps and mari, sparing no effort and labor, the BAM warriors went.

The figures speak eloquently about the scale of this accomplishment. For 10 years of the BAM epic, railroad warriors laid 1,449 km of the main track and more than 330 km of station tracks. More than 220 million cubic meters of earthworks have been completed, 1217 artificial structures have been built, including 45 large and 296 medium bridges, 527 km of communication lines. Over the years, new cities and towns have appeared on the Eastern section of BAM, about 30 stations and sidings have been built. For their arrangement, the BAM soldiers erected 174 thousand square meters. m of housing, 8 schools, 13 kindergartens and a number of other facilities (Appendix 4).

On April 18, 1984, the Military Council of the Railway Troops reported to the General Secretary of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Minister of Defense of the USSR about the opening of through train traffic throughout the Eastern section of BAM.

The Central Committee of the CPSU congratulated all the builders of the Eastern section of the BAM on the remarkable labor achievement of the railroad soldiers. The greeting said:

“Dear comrades! The Central Committee of the CPSU received with great satisfaction the message of your remarkable achievement - the successful fulfillment of socialist obligations for the early completion of the laying of the main track and the opening of through train traffic on the Tynda-Komsomolsk-on-Amur section of the Baikal-Amur Railway.

... It is gratifying to note that this great labor victory was won thanks to the selfless labor of railroad soldiers who contribute to strengthening the economic power of the Motherland, all teams of builders, sponsoring organizations of the Union and Autonomous Republics, territories, regions and cities, young men and women who arrived at the call of the Komsomol to this great construction site. This is the result of the active organizational and mass-political work of commanders, political agencies, headquarters, engineering and technical personnel, party, trade union and Komsomol organizations ... "

On April 28, 1984, celebrations were held dedicated to the opening of through train traffic from Tynda to Komsomolsk-on-Amur. In festive decoration, the train station named after the Hero of the Soviet Union V. P. Miroshnichenko. At the junction of steel rails, railroad warriors set up a pole with pointer arrows showing distances: to Moscow - 7214 km, to Tynda - 491, to Komsomolsk-on-Amur - 995 km.

Representatives of the USSR Ministry of Defense, the Main Political Directorate of the Soviet Army and Navy, the Ministry of Railways, the Ministry of Transport Construction, the Khabarovsk Territory Committee and the Amur Regional Committee of the CPSU, the Central Committee of the All-Union Leninist Young Communist League, the Red Banner Far Eastern Military District, patronage organizations came to the celebrations to the BAM soldiers.

The solemn moment has come. Deputy Minister of Defense of the USSR, Head of the Logistics of the Armed Forces of the USSR Marshal of the Soviet Union S. K. Kurkotkin, First Secretary of the Amur Regional Committee of the CPSU S. S. Avramenko, First Secretary of the Khabarovsk Regional Committee of the CPSU A. K. Cherny, Deputy Head of the Main Political Directorate of the Soviet Army and Military -of the Marine Fleet, Colonel General M. G. Sobolev, Commander of the Red Banner Far Eastern Military District, Army General I. M. Tretyak headed to the docking site.

Docking command issued. Slowly floated in the air the last link, sank to the embankment. The warriors-travelers quickly and deftly mounted it, connecting it with neighboring links. There is a connection! Vostochny BAM is ready for the passage of the First train! Scarlet ribbon cut. Head of the Baikal-Amur Railway V.A. Gorbunov was given a symbolic key to the Eastern section of the BAM, and commemorative wands were handed to the locomotive drivers, Sergeant S. Timoshenko and Soviet Army worker A. Tropin. The orchestra played a solemn march, and under its sounds the First train set off. There is a huge poster on the locomotive: “Accept, Motherland, our gift is a through passage along the Eastern section of BAM!”.

Here at the place of docking a solemn rally was held. Marshal of the Soviet Union S.K. Kurkotkin read out the greetings of the Central Committee of the CPSU to the railway soldiers, all participants in the construction of the Eastern Section of the Baikal-Amur Railway, read out the greetings of the Minister of Defense of the USSR and the head of the Main Political Directorate of the Soviet Army and Navy.

The personnel of the 4th and 39th railway brigades, commanded by Colonels G. I. Kogatko and A. B. Malakhovich, Marshal of the Soviet Union S. K. Kurkotkin presented the Pennant of the Minister of Defense of the USSR "For courage and high labor heroism shown during construction of BAM.

The best excavator operator Private Vladimir Plotnikov sounded excited at the rally:

- Today we report: the task of the Motherland has been completed! he said. — This success was achieved on the eve of the Victory Day of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War. May our labor victory be a kind of salute to the veterans of the past war, to my father, who fought from Kursk to Berlin!

Vladimir Plotnikov handed over to representatives of central and local museums the keys that held the last, "golden" link together.

Elegant and festive was the capital of BAM - the city of Tynda on October 27, 1984. On this day, a rally dedicated to the early opening of train traffic along the entire length of the Baikal-Amur Mainline was held at its station square.

For ten years, the soldiers of the steel highways went to this major victory. It contains the work of thousands of warriors-machine operators, bridgemen, railway workers, signalmen, repairmen, all BAM soldiers who were fortunate enough to take part in the construction of the century. In this victory lies the many-sided organizational activity of commanders, the creative thought of engineers, the hard work of business executives, the mobilizing power of speech and the personal example of political workers. The opening of through traffic along the Eastern section of the BAM was a solid guarantee of the successful commissioning of the entire section in 1989 into permanent operation.

On September 29, 1989, the Eastern section of the BAM was put into operation of the existing lines of the Ministry of Railways. This event became the day of labor glory of the Railway Troops.

The Baikal-Amur Railway was built as a 1st category road. Today it is a modern, highly technically equipped railway with all the elements of arrangement achieved by scientific and technological progress by the end of the 80s. the last century.

The contribution to the victory at BAM is great for every soldier and civilian specialist directly involved in the construction, the contribution of those who worked at BAM and for BAM in other places is noticeable and significant. The special merit of the direct organizers of the construction is F.I. Pribov, A.K. Volkov, Yu.M. Yudin, G.I. Kogatko, I.N. M. Zimina, A. Ya. Milko, N. P. Koshman, A. I. Demin, B. A. Shkibtan, V. V. Lapshina, G. P. Anikina, V. I. Shcherbinina, E. L. Leshchinsky, Yu. P. Pavlyuchkov, L. A. Smirnov, B. M. Boldyrev, V. G. Aidynyan, V. V. Leshchev, A. N. Matyunin, A. I. Belozerov, E. K. Neselovsky, V. N. Mirenkova, V. G. Omelchenko and many others. The apparatus of the Main Directorate of the Railway Troops worked smoothly and efficiently, the main task of which was long-term and operational planning, the effective solution of the mass of questions that arose and the provision of necessary assistance to units and formations. The greatest contribution to the achievement of final results was made by generals and officers A. M. Kryukov, M. K. Makartsev, N. Ya. Rylov, M. Ya. Rylov, N. A. Khomyakov, A. A. Vinogradov, I. S. Matveikov, V. T. Volobuev, G. I. Kupriyanov, Ya. M. Maiorov, I. M. Fedorov, A. F. Stolyarov, B. M. Zemtsov, V. A. Shemuratov, N. F. Ustinov, K. L. Puzyrev, G. P. Lunev, N. A. Chumak, K. A. Zhdanovich, V. G. Ivashov, S. E. Stepanyan, V. N. Vdovin, K. P. Petrov, A. S. Ryzhenkov, V. A. Karlashov, S. P. Danilenko, A. K. Sharikov, A. Ya. Andreev, I. D. Puzyrev, A. G. Komarov, A. K. Sakun, A. S. Butenko, I. I. Rusak, V. S. Malyshev and others.

The headquarters of the Central Committee of the Komsomol on the construction of the BAM and its leaders V. Filippov, V. Sushchevich, activists Yu. Larin, M. Zhilkin, V. Vasilenko, P. Karpov, A. Ivanov, I. Uretsky, V. Safoshkin and many others who stood at the origins of many initiatives aimed at accelerating the construction of the BAM.

The work of the military railway workers was highly appreciated by the country's leadership. More than 1000 people were awarded orders and medals of the USSR for the construction of the Eastern BAM, medals of the USSR Ministry of Defense - 180. More than 56 thousand military personnel were awarded the medal "For the construction of the Baikal-Amur Mainline", 25 Komsomol officers at BAM were awarded the Lenin Komsomol Prize in areas of production, and generals and officers G. I. Kogatko, V. V. Kupriyanov, M. K. Makartsev, S. N. Palchuk, A. A. Shantsev were awarded the title of Hero of Socialist Labor. General V. A. Vasiliev and Captain A. B. Chudakov became laureates of the USSR State Prize.

For high performance in the construction of the Eastern section of the BAM, 1 ZhDK (commander Major General Yudin Yu. M.) was awarded the Order of the October Revolution, the 35th railway brigade (commander Colonel V. I. Poverinov) - the Order of the Red Banner of Labor.

The BAM construction school was attended by many thousands of servicemen. Their experience of working in extreme conditions is an invaluable contribution to solving the tasks of the main purpose of the Railway Troops - technical cover and restoration of the country's railways, especially in the Far East region of the country. The construction of the Eastern section of the BAM allowed the troops to gain experience in managing formations and units in organizing the construction of a 1,500-kilometer railway line in the harsh climatic conditions of Transbaikalia and the Far East when conducting work on a wide front, including organizing redeployment and moving units to work sites.

The issues of organizing the life of personnel (including food supply in autonomous conditions of accommodation), the operation of equipment and the use of technologies for working in conditions of low temperatures, permafrost and mari, have been practically worked out.

BAM, like no other construction project, provided unlimited opportunities to test the production capabilities of units for construction and restoration work in the Far Eastern regions.

At BAM, the optimal structure of mechanization parts necessary for excavation work was determined for specific conditions for a special period. At the same time, it became necessary to equip these parts with mechanisms of greater unit power in the northern version: hydraulic excavators, powerful bulldozers and a sharp increase in the need for drilling equipment for drilling and blasting to loosen the soil.

Bridge parts have accumulated experience in the construction of both permanent and temporary artificial structures in conditions of low temperatures and permafrost. Temporary bridges were built across large water barriers, such as Bureya, Byssa, Duki, Gorin, Unakha, Olongro, Dess. In total, over 1700 linear meters were built. m of temporary bridges for the railway track or the combined movement of rail and road transport. The bridge across the Duki River, burned down by a forest fire in 1976, was being restored in conditions close to wartime, while the restoration rate was 30–35 running meters. m per day. Valuable experience gained in the operation of temporary bridges, especially during flood periods. More than 1,500 temporary bridges and pipes have been built for the highway road, with corrugated metal pipes being widely used. Technical solutions for the bases of temporary bridge supports for the difficult hydrological conditions of the Far Eastern rivers (metal and wooden piles immersed in pre-drilled leader holes, row foundations, etc.) have been identified and practically tested.

Experience in the construction of temporary bridges at BAM specified ways to find optimal solutions for the bases of bridge supports for areas with harsh climatic conditions.

When solving the problems of passing the movement of trains on temporary bridges (mainly due to the non-delivery of metal or reinforced concrete superstructures), standard repair tools, such as the REM-500 flyover, UZhV-LTMP collapsible supports, inventory prefabricated collapsible span structures. Ferry crossings from the property of NZhM-56, as well as ice and pile-ice crossings were used to organize seasonal traffic along highway roads across the Zeya and Selemdzha rivers.

The wide front and significant volumes of earthworks, the superstructure of the track and artificial structures created unlimited opportunities for conducting special training of personnel, improving organization and technology, and mastering the maximum pace of work. This made it possible to achieve the following annual rates of work:

construction of a highway road - 318 km;

earthworks - 25.7 million cubic meters. m;

construction of artificial structures - 155 units;

laying the main track - 195 km;

ballasting - 513 thousand cubic meters m.

At BAM, the structure of units and subdivisions for the temporary operation of finished sections of the road was checked, and the necessary experience in organizing operational work was accumulated.

Before the sections were put into permanent operation, temporary operation was carried out and the working movement of trains was organized along the BAM sections under construction, which made it possible to check the structure of units and subdivisions for the temporary operation of finished sections of the road, to accumulate the necessary experience in organizing operational work.

The rear of the Armed Forces of the USSR, the Far Eastern Military District, and specifically Marshal of the Soviet Union S.K. Kurkotkin and General of the Army V.M. Arkhipov, commanders of the troops of the Far East Military District, Generals of the Army I.M. Tretyak and D.T. Yazov, provided great assistance to the troops at BAM.

The leaders of the Khabarovsk Territory and the Amur Region - A. K. Cherny and S. S. Avramenko, the leaders of the Far Eastern and Bamovskaya Railways - A. G. Andreeev and V. A. Gorbunov, were always aware of the state of affairs at the construction site and provided great assistance to the troops, BAM construction directorates - V. F. Degtyarev and L. G. Makhitarov.

With the commissioning of the BAM, favorable conditions were created for further progress in the construction of steel lines to the still uninhabited regions of the Asian part of Russia. The construction of the BAM is of great importance in strengthening the economy and the country's defense capability.
* * *
BAM is needed by everyone who knows the essence of the issue,
Who looks beyond his own nose
And he thinks about the future of the country.

History is not written in advance:
Brief elements do not dominate her.
BAM is forever! BAM lives and will not die,
As long as Russia itself lives and exists!

"Do you hear the time is buzzing - BAM! In the open spaces of steep - BAM!
And the big taiga submits to us!
Do you hear the time is buzzing - BAM! In the open spaces of steep - BAM!
This is the bell of our young hearts..."
(music by O. Feltsman, lyrics by R. Rozhdestvensky performed by Vladislav Konnov)

On July 8, 1974, the Decree of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR No. 561 "On the construction of the Baikal-Amur Railway" was issued. Prior to this, on March 15, L.I. Brezhnev, at a speech in Alma-Ata, called BAM "the most important construction site of the IX Five-Year Plan", and on April 26, the "All-Union Komsomol Shock Detachment named after the XVII Congress of the Komsomol" was created - the first of such detachments at this construction site. On July 27, the Pravda newspaper published an editorial "From Baikal to Amur" - the first editorial on this construction site. An active propaganda campaign for a new "great construction" began, dating back to the 19th century.

The road joined at 10.05 Moscow time on September 29, 1984 at the Balabukhta junction, but the Golden Crutch nailing ceremony was held at the nearest major station - Kuanda. On the main course, the last rails were laid on October 27 and through traffic was opened along the BAM. At the same time, the Baikal-Amur Railway was organized, from Lena to Komsomolsk with an administrative center in Tynda. But all this vast economy was completely transferred to the operation of the Ministry of Railways only in 1989.

According to the well-established legend, BAM was built by three forces: The Skovorodino - Tynda (and then Tyndinsky settlement) - Neryungri section was built by convicts and this section appeared before anyone else. The first attempts at construction were made in 1932. The gold of Aldan, the coal of Neryungri and the forest of Kalara had to be taken out somehow. (See note no. 4)

The section Komsomolsk - Tynda was built by soldiers ("Komsomol members in military uniform", as they said then), so the road there is the most rotten and slow. Slave labor is the least productive.

The section Lena - Tynda was built by Komsomol volunteers from different parts of our country, and therefore the construction was completed later than everyone else. In addition to the road itself, the entire infrastructure of roadside cities and towns was raised from scratch. They were built by different republics and regions, so the Novaya Chara station station looks like a yurt (Kazakh SSR), the Severobaikalsk station looks like a sea wave (Leningrad), and the Tynda station looks like a swan (Moscow). A complete list of chef regions: Ukraine - Novy Urgal, Belarus - Muyakan, Latvia - Taksimo, Moldova - Alonka, Turkmenistan - Larba, Uzbekistan - Kuanda and Leprindo, Tajikistan - Soloni, Estonia - Kichera, Georgia - Niya. Russian Territories and regions built smaller stations.

I intended to drive along the entire highway (with the exception of the "Zekovsky" section) and understand what benefits the Soviet government was pursuing by harnessing itself to such a project. I remembered the Komsomol romance very well and the obvious unwillingness of ordinary Komsomol members to embark on this dubious adventure. But money, however, could be made. I remember a cute ditty - “How I left for BAM \ With a leather suitcase \ And I returned home \ With x. ladies' rails..."

It is now clear that BAM did not and does not have national economic significance. It is needed only as a stand-in for the Trans-Siberian Railway in case of Chinese military aggression. The Trans-Siberian is located too close to the border and, although the entire border area was (and is now too) occupied by Soviet / Russian troops, one PLA offensive is capable of cutting off the Far East completely.

From Komsomolsk-on-Amur, the diesel locomotive puffs our train to the northwest. The only train on the road running daily - Komsomolsk-on-Amur - Tynda does not cause a stir. Three reserved seats, two compartments and one common car, that's all. The common carriage is filled with students going home to rest before exams. The compartment and reserved seat are filled with more serious people.

In the neighboring compartment car there is even such a luxury as a buffet. It is unprofitable to attach a restaurant car to such a train, so they settled for a gondola car. It consists of half a compartment car (5 pcs.) And a half car of a clean space with a tent and a bar counter. Very spacious and comfortable, you can eat right there. Assortment - nuts, chocolates, juices, beer, vodka, pizzas, pies - all with a moderate margin. Once again I will repeat - with moderate. Sometimes it is even cheaper for locals to buy food from the dining car than in local stores.

As fellow travelers, I got two middle-aged peasants who lived near Tynda and worked on a rotational basis throughout the country. Now they were returning from Sakhalin, where they worked for half a year as drivers on the backfilling of the soil of the oil terminal of the Sakhalin-1 project. One of them, in his youth, worked on the construction of a highway in the Ulanmakit-Muyakan region, and I managed to ask him about the construction of the road and current life.

Outside the window stretched the fences of military units. This section of the BAM was built and settled by the military, so there are a lot of high frequencies here. Yes, and bridges over rivers are guarded much better. Now it is private security armed with real machine guns. Along the banks are armored caps, concrete trenches, and so on. Everything is booked now.

Holgasso is the first village with a huge inscription "Tambov Region". Almost every station has this kind of monuments. The highway itself was built by soldiers, convicts, and ordinary Komsomol members, but the settlements near the station were only free builders. Many of them stayed here to live.

At the Lian station, a motress (such a self-propelled railway car) rolled up to the parallel track, and a bunch of auditors ran from it to our train. Trains on the Far Eastern Railway are generally checked very often. During the entire trip, I encountered only two checks, and both of them fell on the Far Eastern Railway. (Khabarovsk and Lian)

Khurmuli, Mavrinsky, Gorin, Kharpichan, Evoron, Moni, Bolen

The first standing station is Postyshevo (Berezovy village), you can still drive to this place by car. Along the entire BAM, the road laid during construction is preserved. It is now and then gravel, but in some places the bridges have already rotted away. This area is passed year-round by Urals, and in seasons - even by cars. The village itself is very scattered over the area, which is rare for these places. Passengers from Liana got off here, but my fellow travelers and I fell asleep peacefully.

Stations Ebgun, Sonakh, Amgun, Eanga, Sektali, Dzhamku, Badzhal, Urkaltu, Talijan, Gerbi, Orokot, Mogdy, Suluk, Dusse-Alin, Naldy, I slept peacefully. None of them are more or less large. Only trips.

At Soloni station, I had already woken up and began to look out the window with renewed vigor ... Mmm, nothing interesting appeared there compared to yesterday. The settlement at the station was erected by the builders of the Tajik SSR, so it resembles some kind of mausoleum.

Mukunga, Turuk, Mugule, Chemchuko.

Urgal is not one village, but a whole bunch (Urgal, Urgal-1, Middle Urgal and Novy Urgal). On Novy Urgal, the largest parking lot is 32 minutes. A new big station, but there are no old women selling food. Everything is imported, they themselves are not enough. The village is neat and the names of the streets bear the seal of Little Russia - Crimean, Kievskaya ... A short branch departs from Urgal to Chegdomyn station. There is even a daily local train Khabarovsk-Chegdomyn.

And beyond Uragl, Mari begins, i.e. endless swamps on permafrost. Square kilometers of grass and hummocks, and the trees are only standing alone, frail and crooked.

Bureinsk, Chebangda, Alonka, Stlannik, Tuyun, Sugara, Amgan are the stations in Mary. As a rule, at each of them a freight train is waiting for us to pass on the single-track further to the east. In the wagons there is wood, wood, wood, occasionally coal from Neryungri.

Etyrken is the last station in the Khabarovsk Territory, followed by the Amur Region. And therefore - the change of the time zone, I get an hour closer to Moscow, for the first time during this trip. Until now, I've only drifted away. A regular working train reaches Eterken from Urgal itself. And the road rises higher and higher into the mountains.

Here the train crosses large mountain ranges. Larch forests appear on the hills, swamps disappear. The landscape is enlivened only by rare clearings with power lines. There are no settlements in these places at all, all the sidings are served by one station attendant. As a rule, this is a woman dressed in a FULL railway uniform. And I was especially surprised that each DS had a uniform red cap. Some kind of fetishist's dream. Nowhere else have I seen such discipline in dress. Service in the Ministry of Railways is prestigious and respected in these places. In addition, this is almost the only job that pays at least some money. The second monetary work is logging. The whole BAM does nothing but cut wood and transport it to China, since here it is its only cargo.

Ulma, the station on the banks of the river of the same name, Mustakh, Gvozdevsky - tiny sidings with traditional attendants in red caps.

Small station Isa on the pass itself. A trip in three ways, a small hut on duty at the station and the most beautiful mountains around. There is a "serpentine" road, but here a "serpentine" railway. The rails are laid along stone recesses, literally hollowed out in granite mountains.

Isakan, Demchenko, Zvonkoe - here the mountains slowly recede and endless swamps with stunted forests begin again. But sawmills are working with might and main here.

Fevralsk is finally another big station. As always at BAM, a grandiose railway station built by the builders of the Krasnoyarsk Territory, and the absence of passengers. There is no excitement, trains run rarely, rarely. In addition to our daily, only local "scourges" or "scourges". What it is? These are one or two reserved seat cars attached to a diesel locomotive and representing a substitute for an electric train. Freight cars can also cling to passenger cars, in official timetables this is called a "working train". As at any major station in this section, a stele with the numbers of the military units involved in the construction of the road was installed next to the station. The granite monument covered with numbers looks like a stone phone book.

They say that buses run from Fevralsk to Blagoveshchensk and Ekimchan. Tickets are allegedly purchased at the station building. The large Selemdzha River, a tributary of the Amur, flows outside the city. The following stations - Chervinka, Skalisty, Drogoshevsk, Meun, Nora, Dugda, Tangomen, Kamnega are no different from their past brothers-sidings.

Tungala is considered a large station, but compared to any station in the European part, this is a small stopover. Although there is everything that is supposed to be here, and even the Tungalinsky track distance (this is the name of the railway operation office) with repair and recovery trains. The village itself was built by the builders of the Novosibirsk region. Brrr... It's scary to live in such places, natural wilderness.

The next station has an intricate name - "Razezd named after the hero of the Soviet Union Miroshnichenko", which is reflected in concrete letters on the monument next to the station.

Despite the summer, the evening is cold (no more than 6-8 degrees), and here it is also raining. It is bad if the weather will be like this tomorrow. We pass small stations Ulagir, Moldavsky, Ogoron. After Ogoron, sleep puts me on the shelf.

We passed Verkhnezeisk late at night and could not see anything. And I really wanted to see Zeya and the giant reservoirs. They say it's very beautiful, but sometimes you also need to sleep.

Morning found us at Dipkun station. This is already not far from Tynda (6 hours drive) and the village itself looks more cheerful than others. Solid brick houses, paved roads, well, as everywhere - a civil station. And all night we passed only six stations (Ulyanovsk Builder, Izhak, Apetenok, Verkhnezeysk, Tutaul, Dess), such are the local distances.

Unaha, Marevaya, Jalingra,

Bestuzhevo. We can say that this is a satellite city of Tynda, with which it is connected by a good asphalt road. Here, 22 kilometers away, there are children's camps, a rest home and even a bomb shelter. A branch from South Yakutia, from Neryungri, also approaches the Bestuzhevo station. From there, coking coal is intensively transported and the road feels good. Even the continuation of the journey deep into Yakutia, to the Tommot station, and then, you see, to Yakutsk itself is being prepared.

The train crosses a bridge over the small Gilyui River, a tributary of the Zeya.

Shakhtaum, the last station before Tynda, the village of Vostochny is located nearby (5 five-story buildings, several barracks and that's it). There are only 7 kilometers left to the "Capital of BAM". The first and most difficult 1469 km to the house behind.

And now, behind the mountain, houses and pipes of the city of Tynda appeared. The capital of BAM was waiting for me. (that is, the continuation will follow ...)