A catastrophic earthquake in Armenia occurred 27 years ago, on December 7, 1988. It destroyed the city of Spitak in thirty seconds and caused severe destruction to the cities of Leninakan, Kirovakan and Stepanavan. In total, 21 cities, 350 villages and settlements were affected by the disaster. Only according to official figures, 25 thousand people died. One of several thousand volunteers who worked in the earthquake zone, Gennady Kirilenko shared his memories with Sputnik Armenia.

black months

We learned about the tragedy in Armenia in the morning at a lecture at Rostov State University. The Internet did not exist, there was too little information in the news, but rumors about the scale of the disaster spread instantly. In the afternoon, without any command from above, students and teachers lined up to donate blood. In the main building on Bolshaya Sadovaya, people carried canned food, jars of Don pickles, Azov bream, pasta and cereals, in general, everything that they had in store in the pantries of Rostov Khrushchev for a rainy day. And "black" then were not days - months and years of empty store shelves, coupons for oil, washing powder, sugar.

Everyone considered it their duty to help wounded Armenia at least somehow. The decision to go to the earthquake zone was born spontaneously, in the same place at a lecture. For several years, we, students of different faculties, traveled around the godforsaken corners of the international construction team, so we quickly gathered. Armenians, Russians, Dagestanis, Ukrainians, Chechens, Azerbaijanis, Abkhazians, Georgians… Who could have known then that in just a few years we would be separated by borders, and someone would look at each other through the sight of a machine gun.

Lost bus

University "Ikarus" could take about forty people, but there were five times more applicants. We had to weed out the people through a medical board - bespectacled, hypertensive patients and just nerds remained in Rostov.

Early in the morning, when rescue work was already in full swing in Armenia, we set off. All the food collected at the Russian State University was loaded into the luggage compartments of the bus. Behind us was a cargo ZIL of a military department with tents, tools, medical equipment. In the evening we reached the border with Abkhazia, where we spent the night in the bus. The first serious incident happened near Tbilisi - we lost ZIL. The truck driver fell behind the bus and got lost at the entrance to the city. We decided to wait for him at the Tbilisi bus station.

Now there are mobile phones, but then, according to the logic of our driver, all those who got lost had to look for each other at bus stations. On the windshield of the "Ikarus" there was a sign "Special flight Rostov-Spitak" attached, so as soon as we got off the bus, we were surrounded by drivers of the same old Georgian ikaruses, lions and paziks. We drove almost a thousand kilometers on Rostov fuel - the hoses of all gas stations along the way were tightened into a knot. We needed diesel. The Georgians silently dispersed and returned after a while, each with a canister of priceless fuel drained from their cars. And we stood, smoked and did not know what to do next. To go to Spitak without tents and tools seemed absurd to us.

Several nervous hours passed. It seemed that the entire Tbilisi bus station was looking suspiciously at our bus, which was in no hurry to go where help from all over the country flocked. The way out came by itself. On foot, in a shabby sheepskin coat, a hat with earflaps and with thick stubble on his face - like everyone else in those parts who mourns for the dead. I did not remember the name of this Armenian, who was on the bed-post to get home to the ruined Kirovakan. He approached us with a request to take him with him, and in five minutes we were already leaving towards Armenia. By the way, the ill-fated ZIL, having circled around Tbilisi, eventually left for Leninakan. I am sure that everything that we carried with us was not superfluous there either.

© Sputnik / Alexander Grashchenkov

Why do I hate the cold so much

When they say "an earthquake wiped the city off the face of the earth", this is about Spitak. Ruins, fittings, people black with grief, coffins on the streets, in the yards, the stadium, everywhere. It was very cold. There was a sweet, cloying smell in the frosty air. It's through the streets former city, almost to the ankle, spilled molasses from the tanks of the collapsed factory.

Builders, the military, and just those who survived the meat grinder warmed themselves round the clock around the fires. The commandant of the site gave us summer double tents, put us on allowance and divided into brigades. The place for the camp was found in the yard of the destroyed kindergarten. Toys, furniture, mattresses from cribs were scattered around. We lined the floors of the tents with them. We slept without undressing, four of us, so it was warmer, synchronously turning from side to side. Everyone woke up silvery from frost. Maybe after that I do not like the cold, winter and everything connected with it.

Igor Mikhalev

There were no problems with food and tools - at every intersection, or rather, where they were before December 7, 1988, there were field kitchens, canned food, boxes of butter, bread. About a week later, not far from us, a canteen appeared. Well, as a dining room - these were tables and benches hastily knocked together from a picket fence in the open. On the tables are a mountain of bowls, mugs, spoons. Nearby is a huge cauldron and the smell of pilaf. An elderly Uzbek fussed around him with a ladle. I asked who he was and how he got here. What he answered me very accurately reflected the essence of relations between people a quarter of a century ago.

You know, I was a kid when the same tragedy happened in Tashkent. I remember well how the entire Union was restoring our capital. And when it happened here, I thought that now it's my turn. I have a cauldron, a wife and children, so I took them all with me on the train and arrived in Spitak. The military gives us food and we feed everyone who is hungry. I couldn't do it any other way, you know?

last hope

The first object where our team worked was a garment factory. All the living, wounded and dead, who could be quickly found, were taken out on the very first day. We had to go through the rubble again in search of bodies not found. It is clear that there could no longer be living people there, in such a frost. We had nothing but hands, crowbars and shovels. Therefore, it was impossible to "untie" the reinforced concrete structures of the factory, woven into knots by the elements. Nevertheless, hour after hour we dismantled bales of fabrics, accessories, mangled sewing machines.

© Sputnik / Alexander Makarov

Builders from the Baltic States, crane operators from Ukraine, paratroopers from Ryazan worked nearby. And rescuers from Poland. At that time, we did not have any Ministry of Emergency Situations, special equipment, thermal imagers and other equipment with the SPETS prefix, which could quickly help find and save people. But the Poles had it. Bulgarians, jacks, some other devices. And dogs. It was they who accurately indicated the places where you need to look for people under the rubble. Come, sniff and sit down. So, you need to look exactly here.

That day we were dismantling the freight elevator shaft. In the morning the Poles came, three rescuers and a dog. The dog turned around and sat up. For the whole day, on a patch of three by three meters, we could only go one and a half or two meters deep. By dusk we reached and removed a piece of the ceiling of the mangled elevator. The body of a dead young girl was also found there. An old woman, all in black, came to the identification. Weepy eyes. On the day of the earthquake, her entire extended family went to work. And in the evening none of them returned home. And this girl was her granddaughter. And the last hope that at least someone survived ...

© Sputnik / Igor Mikhalev

More than twenty-six years ago (December 7, 1988) Armenia was shaken by a strong earthquake in the city of Spitak, which was completely destroyed in half an hour, and with it 58 surrounding villages. The settlements of Gyumri, Vanadzor, Stepanavan suffered. Minor destruction affected 20 cities and over 200 villages located at some distance from the epicenter.

The strength of the earthquake

At the same place, earthquakes have happened before - in 1679, 1840 and 1931, but they did not even reach 4 points. And in 1988, already in the summer, seismographs recorded fluctuations in the Spitak region and its environs at 3.5 points on the Richter scale.

The very same earthquake in Spitak, which occurred on December 7, had a force of 10 points at the epicenter (the highest mark of 12 points). Most of the republic was subject to shocks with a power of up to 6 points. Echoes of tremors were felt in Yerevan and Tbilisi.

Experts who assessed the scale of the disaster report that the amount of energy released from earth's crust, equal to ten atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima. It is noteworthy that the blast wave that bypassed the Earth was recorded on several continents. Data in the report "Earthquake. Spitak, 1988" report that the total surface break was equal to 37 kilometers, and its displacement amplitudes were almost up to 170 cm.

Scale of the catastrophe

What are the official data characterizing this earthquake? Spitak-1988 is almost 30 thousand dead and more than 140 thousand disabled. The destruction that has affected industry and infrastructure is also disappointing. Among them is 600 km highways, 230 industrial enterprises, 410 medical institutions. Work has been stopped

The earthquake in Spitak caused great damage. The financiers of the world estimated it at almost 15 billion dollars, and the number of victims exceeded all the global averages for those affected by natural disasters. The Armenian authorities at that time were not able to independently eliminate the consequences of the tragedy, and all the republics of the USSR and many foreign states immediately joined the work.

Elimination of consequences: friendship of peoples and political motives

On December 7, surgeons who could work in military field conditions and rescuers from Russia flew to the crash site. In addition to them, doctors from the USA, Great Britain, Switzerland and France worked at the crash site. Donor blood and medicines were supplied by China, Japan and Italy, and came from more than 100 countries.

On December 10, the head of the USSR, Mikhail Gorbachev, flew to the site of the tragedy (now it was ruins instead of a prosperous city). For the sake of helping people and monitoring the rescue process, he interrupted his visit to the United States.

Two days before Gorbachev's arrival, humanitarian aid arrived from Sochi. The helicopter carried everything necessary to save the lives of the victims and ... coffins. The last ones were missing.

The stadiums of the Spitak schools became heliports, hospitals, evacuation points and mortuaries at the same time.

Causes of the tragedy and ways out

The reasons that led to large-scale destruction due to such a phenomenon as an earthquake in Spitak, experts call the untimely and incomplete assessment of seismic vibrations in the region, shortcomings in compiling normative documents And poor quality construction works and medical care.

Remarkably, the Union threw all its strength, money and labor, to help the victims of the disaster in Spitak: more than 45,000 volunteers came from the republics alone. Tens of thousands of parcels from all over the Soviet Union arrived in the city and surrounding settlements as humanitarian aid.

But even more interesting is the fact that in 1987-1988, Azerbaijanis, Russians and Muslims were expelled from Armenian lands literally at gunpoint. People were cut off their heads, they were crushed by cars, beaten to death and walled up in chimneys, sparing neither women nor children. In the book of the writer Sanubar Saralla “The Stolen History. Genocide” provides eyewitness accounts of those events. The writer says that the Armenians themselves call the tragedy in Spitak God's punishment for their misdeeds.

Residents of Azerbaijan also participated in the elimination of the consequences of the disaster by supplying gasoline, equipment and medicine to Spitak and the surrounding cities. However, Armenia refused their help.

Spitak, the earthquake in which became an indicator international relations of that time, in fact confirmed the fraternal USSR.

View after 1988

The earthquake in Spitak gave the first impetus to the creation of an organization for the prediction, prevention and elimination of natural origin. So, twelve months later, in 1989, the start of the work of the State Commission for Emergency Situations, known since 1991 as the Ministry of Emergency Situations of the Russian Federation, was officially announced.

Spitak after the earthquake is a controversial and at the same time painful phenomenon for the country. Almost 27 years have passed since the tragedy, but decades later, Armenia is still recovering. In 2005, there were almost 9 thousand families who lived in barracks without amenities.

In memory of the dead

Date December 7 - Day of mourning for those killed in the disaster, announced by the government. For Armenia, this is a black day. In December 1989, the Mint of the Union issued a three-ruble coin in memory of the Spitak earthquake. After 20 years, in 2008, a monument erected by the public was unveiled in the small town of Gyumri. It was called "Innocent Victims, Merciful Hearts" and was dedicated to all the victims who suffered in Spitak on 12/07/1988.

Natural disasters have occurred at all stages of development human civilization. The earthquake in Armenia on December 7, 1988 is one of the most destructive of them. Since the catastrophe coincided with the beginning of the Karabakh war, and then the collapse of the USSR followed, and to this day, many settlements located in the disaster zone have not yet healed the wounds inflicted by the raging nature.

December earthquake in Armenia

According to scientists, this small Transcaucasian country is located in an extremely seismic zone. What happened on December 7 (an earthquake in Armenia) happened earlier. This is evidenced by the ruins of ancient cities and is mentioned in manuscripts in which eyewitness monks in different centuries left records of what happened when “the Lord was angry with people, and the earthly firmament left under their feet.”

In 1988, those who remembered the earthquake in Armenia that occurred on October 22, 1926 were still alive. It affected the same region as Spitak, but was less destructive. In addition, in the first decades of the 20th century, the population of the northern regions of the Armenian USSR was quite small, so there were many fewer victims than during the 1988 disaster.

Seismic characteristics of the Spitak earthquake

The disaster occurred on December 7, 1988 at 10:41 Moscow time. The epicenter was the village of Nalband (today Shirakamut), located near the city of Spitak, where the magnitude of the tremors was 10 points on the MSK-64 scale. Tremors were also felt in settlements:

• Leninakan (Gyumri) - 9 points.
• Kirovakan (Vanadzor) - 8-9 points.
• Stepanavan - 9 points.
• Yerevan - 6 points.

The main shock lasted 35-45 seconds, followed by less intense aftershocks. According to eyewitnesses, a few days before the earthquake, weak tremors were observed. In addition, in artificial reservoirs where fish were grown, it floated and remained on the surface, and domestic animals also behaved extremely restlessly.

The situation in the USSR in 1988

The second half of the 80s was a difficult time for the entire Soviet Union. The democratization announced by M. Gorbachev led to the growth of national consciousness in most of the republics. In the same time economic problems, inherited by the new leadership of the country from the era of stagnation, became the reason that a significant part of the citizens living in national entities, began to look for the root of all ills in the absence of independence. A particularly tense situation has developed where the fire of ethnic conflicts has been smoldering for centuries, and the borders have been drawn without taking into account the opinion of the population.

The situation in the republic at the time when the earthquake occurred in Armenia (1988)

In 1987, in the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Region, where more than 76% of the population were Armenians, a movement arose to join the Armenian USSR. A collection of signatures was announced, in which 80,000 residents of Karabakh took part. On February 20, 1988, taking into account the opinion of the majority of the population, the people's deputies of the NKAR decided to appeal to the leadership of the USSR with a request to withdraw from the AzSSR. In response, at the end of February 1988, brutal pogroms began in Sumgayit and Baku, during which Armenians who had nothing to do with the events in Karabakh were killed and expelled from their homes. Since Moscow did not take adequate measures to punish those responsible for the murder of citizens on a national basis, mass protests began in Yerevan. To prevent their escalation, troops were brought into the republic, which were obliged to perform punitive functions. This measure caused even more indignation among the population. At the same time, the presence a large number the military helped to quickly organize the rescue of the victims in the first hours after the earthquake in Armenia in 1988.

December 7

This day is still remembered in great detail by all residents of Armenia without exception, including those who were five or six years old in 1988. Even in Yerevan, which is 98 km away from the epicenter, the aftershocks caused panic and brought people to the streets. As for the disaster zone itself, within 35-40 seconds, entire neighborhoods and villages turned into ruins and buried tens of thousands of people under them. In the first hours after the earthquake in Armenia in 1988, in some settlements there was simply no one to carry out rescue work. Fortunately, help from Yerevan soon began to arrive and southern regions country. In addition to organized groups, thousands of citizens who were worried about their relatives went to the disaster zone in their own vehicles.

Victims

The earthquake in Armenia on December 7, 1988 killed at least 25,000 people and left 19,000 disabled. In the first two days, the situation was complicated by the fact that almost all the hospitals in the disaster area were destroyed, and most of the medical staff died or were under the rubble. Thus, the provision of qualified medical care was carried out for the most part by mobile medical teams arriving from neighboring regions of Armenia. In addition, many people who found themselves under the rubble died, since the seventh or eighth number of rescuers was sorely lacking, and the work to extract the victims was mostly carried out by volunteers who literally raked the rubble with their bare hands.

Help

The earthquake in Armenia did not leave people indifferent in the most remote corners of the planet. Even after 27 years, rescuers and builders from dozens of regions of the RSFSR, the Ukrainian, Byelorussian SSR and other parts of the republic are remembered with warmth and gratitude. Soviet Union. Many residents of Spitak, left homeless, survived thanks to Kazakh yurts. Help soon began to arrive from abroad. In particular, groups of highly qualified rescuers from European countries were sent to the republic. The Armenian diasporas also provided great assistance. In particular, the world-famous chansonnier Charles Aznavour personally came to his historical homeland to draw the attention of the world community to the situation in the earthquake zone. The role played by the then Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR N. Ryzhkov, who in 2008 the Republic of Armenia included among its National Heroes (a total of fifteen people on the list), is also invaluable.

Reasons for so many casualties

According to experts, the earthquake in Armenia (1988) can be considered unique. The fact is that there should not have been such a large number of victims during tremors of such force. The clue to this phenomenon was established by a commission that conducted investigations at the crash site. In particular, the experts found that the lion's share of the collapsed structures were located in the then-new microdistricts of Spitak, Kirovakan and Leninakan, which were built with gross violations of all building codes and without taking into account the level of seismic hazard in the region. Thus, many victims of the earthquake in Armenia died as a result of the negligence of builders, including designers and foremen, who sold cement and other building materials, replacing them with ordinary sand.

The situation "in the disaster zone" today

Although the earthquake in Armenia took place more than 27 years ago, the territory that was hit by the elements continues to be called and to some extent a "disaster zone" even today. There are many reasons for this. This is the protracted Karabakh war, which, despite the truce, takes 1-2 lives of young soldiers every week, and the blockade by Turkey and Azerbaijan, and the country's lack of a raw material base, which makes its economy extremely vulnerable and unstable. At the same time, it cannot be said that nothing has been done by the Armenian government over the past years to restore the destroyed cities and villages. In particular, new micro-districts appeared there, where people were relocated from temporary houses built immediately after the earthquake. And if problems with housing are more or less solved, then the situation with the restoration of industrial enterprises is quite different. The fact is that before the earthquake in Armenia on December 7, 1988, up to 40% of the production capacity of the republic was located in the northern regions of this country. Most of them were destroyed, and for various reasons they were never restored, so today there is an extremely high level of unemployment in the area where the earthquake took place.

Now you know how and when the earthquake occurred in Armenia, and what was the reason for so many victims.

In December, the film "Earthquake" is released. Sarik Andreasyan dedicated to the tragic events in Armenia. 28 years ago, almost half of the country's territory was affected by a powerful blow of the elements, thousands of people died, being trapped in stone captivity of destroyed houses. Then this trouble, without exaggeration, rallied the whole world. Help for the victims came not only from the Union republics, but also from other countries. It was a common grief, one for all.

Under the rubble

The main blow of the elements fell on the city of Spitak, which was at the epicenter of the earthquake; Leninakan, Kirovakan, Stepanavan and about 300 other settlements also suffered. Eyewitnesses of those terrible events said that in the first seconds, from strong vertical shocks, the houses literally jumped into the air, and then folded into a reinforced concrete pile, burying everyone inside. Those who were on the street at that moment could hardly stand on their feet, the ground was shaking. In a panic, many crowded in open squares and squares, afraid of being buried alive under the ruins of houses. After 30 seconds, the roar of collapsing buildings was replaced by silence, and a huge cloud of dust hung in the air.

When the aftershocks ended, someone could not recover from the shock, someone hurried home, hoping to find relatives and friends. But it was not possible to free people from the rubble on their own. The help of professional rescuers was needed. Alas, it did not come immediately, because the infrastructure of the republic was also badly damaged. And when the incident was announced on television, Armenia rushed great amount wishing not only to help, but also to cash in on someone else's grief. As a result, all roads were clogged, which only aggravated the situation. Civil defense regiments could not get through to the scene of the tragedy.

The streets of the city. Photo: RIA Novosti / Igor Mikhalev

The hardest thing was for those who were trapped in the stone captivity of their own homes. Some people remained completely immobilized under the rubble for several days. They didn't know what had happened or if help would come. history Emma Hakobyan and her three month old daughter Mariam knows the whole world. A woman with a child spent seven long days under the ruins of her house and only miraculously survived. At first she breastfed her daughter, but when the milk was gone, she pierced her finger, and maternal blood was used. Emma was taken out from under the rubble for 6 hours. But this story with a happy ending is rather an exception to the rule, in most cases people died without waiting for help.

Mass graves of victims of the earthquake. Leninakan, 1988 Photo: www.globallookpress.com

One sorrow for all

While most of the people were overwhelmed with grief and mourned the dead, the marauders were in a hurry to enrich themselves. They robbed savings banks and shops, without a twinge of conscience appropriated other people's things. They did not disdain anything: they tore earrings straight out of the ears of the dead, cut off fingers with rings. To stop this arbitrariness, 20 thousand military personnel came to the aid of the victims.

Along with egregious cases of looting, there were absolutely opposite stories. So, in Leninakan, relatives of the victims and the dead were released from colonies and prisons to help in excavating the rubble. They released 250 people - they returned a week later, only one escaped. Soon he was arrested.

Two days after the tragedy, he flew to Armenia general secretary Central Committee of the CPSU Mikhail Gorbachev. The news of the earthquake caught him during an official visit to the United States. Gorbachev urgently returned to the Union, he arrived in Armenia with his wife. According to eyewitnesses, seeing the scale of the disaster, Raisa Maksimovna burst into tears.

Rescue work. Photo: RIA Novosti / Alexander Makarov

The first days were especially difficult for Armenia, the number of deaths was in the thousands. The elimination of the consequences of the earthquake was carried out not only by professionals, but also by many volunteers. These people worked for days, with little or no sleep and rest, they lost their health, and sometimes they simply went crazy, unable to cope with their own emotions.

Assistance to the affected republic was provided not only by the entire Union, but also by many foreign countries. Doctors and rescuers from France, Switzerland, Great Britain, Germany and America arrived in Armenia. More than 100 states provided humanitarian support. It seemed that the tragedy united the whole world. However, the collapse of the USSR broke plans to restore the destroyed cities.

New life

Almost immediately after the tragedy, an operation to restore them began in the affected settlements. 45,000 builders from all the Union republics left for the disaster areas. Already on January 7, the first house was laid in Leninakan, and at the end of the year its new residents celebrated their housewarming.

Of course, it is reasonable to ask why the 1988 earthquake became so devastating and destroyed entire cities. The answer was simple: construction in the republic was carried out in violation of technology, and the quality of the materials used was very low. It is for this reason that the elements left over five hundred thousand people without a roof over their heads in a matter of seconds.

Restoration of housing in Leninakan, 1989 Photo: www.globallookpress.com

The earthquake in Armenia was a kind of impetus for the republics of the USSR to have a system for preventing and eliminating the consequences of various emergencies. Previously, there was not even an elementary plan of action in extreme conditions. Many leaders gave orders intuitively, for example, Head of the Internal Affairs Directorate of Leninakan Levan Galastyan at his own peril and risk, he ordered to completely shut off the gas. Subsequently, it became clear that if he had not turned off the gas without permission, the city would have burned, and the number of victims would have increased significantly.

Alas, a person often forgets what should never be forgotten. If in the first years after the tragedy, every December 7, the country mourned the dead, then over time everything came to naught. Today, the new generation does not even know what happened back in 1988.