Arzamas railway accident - the explosion of a train traveling from Dzerzhinsk to Kazakhstan. The accident occurred in June 1988. The train was transporting explosives. For several months, a special commission worked at the scene of the accident, but to no avail. It was not possible to establish the causes of the Arzamas railway accident .
The end of the eighties marked the beginning of an era of change. However, many understood that the collapse of the existing system would soon come. And as if to confirm this in the second half of the eighties in the USSR there was a series of major accidents. One of them is the Arzamas railway accident.
How it was
On June 4, a train approached the Arzamas I railway station. For about 300 meters there was a station where the train stood for 20 minutes. Half of the locomotive suddenly exploded near the city. The driver Yuri Mikanovich survived. He lost consciousness, woke up ten minutes after the disaster. He stepped out of the cab and saw hell ...
A powerful explosion tore the train into two. The back section turned into a pile of mangled metal. Mikanovich saw people rushing about in panic - their houses were completely destroyed. A terrible accident occurred, which went down in history as the Arzamas railway accident. But what caused the explosion? Accident or sabotage?
Blown up city
The reasons for the Arzamas railway accident have not been established. But the accident is not forgotten. Several documentaries were shot about the tragedy, one of them is “The Blasted City”.
Arzamas railway accident occurred at 9:30. It was a hot Saturday day. Many residents of the nearby village went to personal plots. This terrible accident is dedicated to the aforementioned series of the documentary series “Investigation Waged.” Arzamas railway disaster claimed more than 90 lives, changed the fate of those who survived. About them is told in a documentary film with Leonid Kanevsky.
One of the heroines of the film is Tamara Sukhamozova. That day, she, like many, decided to spend in the infield, where she went with her husband. As soon as they crossed the railroad tracks, a monstrous explosion occurred. Tamara woke up and saw a terrible black mushroom above herself. Then the husband who lay motionless. He was dead.
The giant mushroom overhead was creeping ominously. One would think that this is nothing but an atomic explosion. An eyewitness managed to take some photos. The Arzamas railway accident was an incredible explosion, which was heard throughout the city. This event was imprinted in the memory of Tamara and other witnesses of that terrible tragedy for life. What the residents of Arzamas saw resembles scary shots from films about the end of the world.
Fire extinguishing
A few minutes later, a fire alarm sounded at a local fire station. Nobody called the rescuers - the telephone connection was broken. But as already mentioned, the explosion thundered throughout the city. Several cars drove to the scene. Within a few minutes, the tankers were at the epicenter of the explosion. However, it was not so easy to extinguish the fire - houses, sheds, storage rooms were burning. Suddenly it became clear: the explosion also destroyed the water supply system.
How did firefighters put out the fire? Arzamas is located on the right bank of Teshi. Firefighters first delivered water from the river by tankers, sprinklers, and even buckets. Then they managed to establish water intake.
There were dozens of injured. Someone no longer needed help. Many were bleeding and could die at any moment. In the filming of a documentary film dedicated to the 1988 Arzamas railway accident, the head of the 4th detachment of the paramilitary fire department took part. Shamil Aydagulov and his assistants still put out the fire. However, at the time of the explosion, more than 50 people died. Aydagulov recalled that among the dead were children. Details of the Arzamas disaster were not covered in Soviet newspapers. But according to rough estimates, about 1,500 people were injured.
History of Olya Malakhovskaya
Near the station at the time of the accident there was a bus. His roof was blown away. Inside were both the dead and those who could still be saved. The bus was a ten-year-old Olga Malakhovskaya, who remained alive, but received numerous deep cuts.
From the salon, the girl in her arms was taken out by her mother. His father was blown away several meters from the car, but, fortunately, he did not receive serious injuries. Moreover, he helped people get out of the bus. His daughter was taken to the hospital by a family friend who accidentally passed by at that moment. Olya was transported to the city of Gorky, where she underwent several operations.
Hexogen
Already half an hour after the disaster, the entire city and regional leadership left for the scene. No one could understand the cause and nature of the explosion. It was not known whether it was dangerous to be at the scene of the tragedy.
KGB officers also arrived at the station. First of all, it was necessary to determine what kind of cargo was in the locomotive. The driver’s cab was not seriously damaged. It contained documentation for the transported cargo, thanks to which it was possible to establish: in three compositions of the ill-fated locomotive there was hexogen. This is a powerful explosive. The train, which followed the morning of June 4, 1988, to the Arzamas I station, carried 120 tons of RDX and spent.
The explosion caused tremendous damage to the city. The destruction occurred within a radius of 2000 meters. 250 meters of the railroad track were destroyed. The accident destroyed the main station building and station buildings. 44 residential buildings were completely destroyed.
The story of Natasha Galanina
This is another resident of Arzamas who suffered on June 4, 1988. A teenage girl lived in one of the houses destroyed by the disaster. Later, she recalled that on that day she had a disturbing foreboding. From early morning she did not find a place for herself. At that moment, when she went to the window, a terrible explosion brought out the glass. Natalia felt an unbearable pain in her face.
The house where she lived was completely demolished on 4 June. The girl was under the rubble. Parents got their daughter out of the wreckage. Natasha had several operations, but because of the gangrene that had begun, she had to amputate her arm.
The threat of the second explosion
From the place of the tragedy they carried out all those who showed signs of life. Meanwhile, the threat of a second explosion appeared. The composition was a tank with liquefied gas, to which the fire crept very close. The soldiers who took part in putting out the fire and saving people dragged the heavy tank with their bare hands.
Health care
The blast wave destroyed the windows in the city hospital. A trauma doctor and a nurse who were on duty that day immediately hung wet sheets on the windows. They realized that an accident had occurred, and therefore hastily began to prepare to receive the victims. But 10-20 minutes passed, and the victims of the disaster were not brought to the hospital. There was an ominous silence. Only somewhere in the distance did a siren howl.
Suddenly, at the beginning of the 12th the doors opened and the wounded were brought into the hospital corridor. In just a few minutes, the entire room was occupied by a stretcher with bloodied people. And when everything was already occupied, the wounded were left in the territory adjacent to the hospital, which that day turned into a field hospital.
Surgeons did the operation after operation. The flow of victims did not stop. On June 4, 1988, the wounded were brought here with such severe and terrible injuries that local doctors had not seen before. All employees of the Arzamas hospital came to work. Nobody specifically called them. Upon learning of the disaster, the doctors rushed to the rescue.
Sabotage
According to safety regulations, explosives cannot be stored in several wagons located one after another. Between them there should be wagons with another cargo or empty. This rule has been violated.
The explosion occurred near a large tank farm. If the train had not stopped before the move, the consequences would have been even sadder. This detail served as the basis for the version that the explosion did not happen by chance. But before drawing conclusions, it was necessary to conduct more than one examination.
Causes of the accident
Security officials interviewed dozens of witnesses. The version that the catastrophe was carefully planned was not confirmed. Investigators concluded that the cause of the explosion was a combination of factors (negligence, violation of the rules). But this is not an official version. The case was not closed.
Arzamas funnel
As if a terrible battle disfigured the land on which the Arzamas railway accident occurred. The funnel formed at the site of the tragedy was 85 meters long and 28 meters wide. Its depth was 10 meters. At the time of the accident, several dozen cars stood at the crossing. They were smashed into small pieces. How many people died there is unknown.
The explosion destroyed 150 houses. More than eight hundred families were left homeless. For residents of Arzamas who lost their shelter, a microdistrict was erected as soon as possible. Today there is a chapel in place of the destroyed houses, and on its wall are memorial plaques with the names of the dead.