Hydrographic Society Russia

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Each year before Victory Day (in Russia 9th May) a group of veteran-hydrographers makes a trip to the west coast of Ladoga Lake. There, close to the lighthouse Osinovets, is a memorial to those who were lost in Ladoga Lake on the 17th September 1941.
That day, a tugboat was towing a wooden barge from blockaded Leningrad to the ‘big earth’ with a few hundred people onboard. Amongst them there were more than two hundred hydrographers: officers and employees of the Hydrographic Department, teachers and cadets of the Hydrographic Naval School. During the trip a heavy gale arose and the old wooden barge was destroyed. Most of the passengers were lost in the waters of Ladoga Lake, among them 79 officers and employees of the Hydrographic Department and 136 teachers and cadets of the Hydrographic Naval School.
On 7th May this year, a small group of HSR members visited this sad place to lay flowers on the monument to the lost hydrographers. Among the participants was veteran-hydrographer Captain 1 rank (ret.) Ratmir Berkutov who at the age of eight, was evacuated from Leningrad by Ladoga Lake. It was nice that this group included not only veterans but also two boys and three students from the Hydrographic faculty of the Naval Academy. As usual after this ceremony, a very kind woman called Vera Ivanovna, who lives close to the monument permitted participants to partake of a light commemorative repast in her little homestead. This trip was made possible thanks to the support of Admiral A. Komaritsyn, Chief of the Head Department of Navigation and Oceanography, Ministry of Defence, Russia.
On 26th May, the President of the HSR, Dr Nikolay Neronov, received a visit from a descendant of the famous Russian hydrographic family Vil’kitskij (transcription of name adopted in Russia), Peter Wilkitzki who lives in Germany. The meeting took place in the private office of Admiral A. Komaritsyn Ð Chief of the Head Department of Navigation and Oceanography, Ministry of Defence, Russia. Peter is a great-grandson of Andrey I. Vil’kitskij, former Head of the Hydrographic Department in Russia and grandson of Boris A. Vil’kitskij, who discovered the Archipelago Severnaya Zemlya. During the meeting, Admiral A. Komaritsin made a short excursion around HDNO and let it be known that in a shipyard in the town of Rybinsk a new hydrographic vessel is being built to be named ‘Vaygatch’, after the old hydrographic vessel on which Boris Vil’kitskij discovered Archipelago Severnaya Zemlya.

Photograph
President of HSR Dr N. Neronov, investigating his archives, discovered one photograph which, though not entirely relevant, may be of interest. This photograph was made in 1967 during the IX International Hydrographic Conference in Monaco on board of Her Majesty's Hydrographic Vessel Hecla. In 1972 Rear Admiral Steve Ritchie became the first President of the Hydrographic Society, London and twenty years afterwards, in 1992, Captain N. Neronov became the first President of the Hydrographic Society, Russia.


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The Hydrographic Society,
Russia (HSR)
Att. Viktor Rybine
Kozhevennaja linija 41
Saint-Petersburg 199106
Russia
Tel/Fax: +7 812 350 5026