Monument to firefighters killed in extinguishing fires from fascist air raids on Grozny

During the years of World War II, Grozny was of great strategic importance, having a powerful oil and oil refining industry. During the war, combustible and lubricating materials mined in Grozny “fed” the Red Army military equipment and the national economy. Even without refining, our Grozny oil from Grozny was poured into fuel tanks by our tankers and went to the front. Despite the partial dismantling of the equipment of the factories and crafts of Grozny in connection with the outbreak of war, the city had large reserves of fuel. In this regard, the German command counted on Grozny oil, gasoline and oil. The Germans calculated the gross and net, as if they were already masters of Grozny oil. He sat in Maykop and was expecting a German oil trust with a full staff of engineers to move to Grozny. ^{[1] [2]} Having only one Romanian source of oil, the Wehrmacht tank divisions were already beginning to stifle oil hunger. For two fronts (Stalingrad and Grozny) fuel was sorely lacking. Due to the lack of gasoline, Rommel’s tanks, recalled to Stalingrad from northern Africa, did not reach Stalingrad, the pilots were surprised to see the top of the lifeless column of tanks in a yellow desert camouflage ... And the Germans had already prepared special issues with sold out on the capture of Grozny on August 24, 1942. On this day, they wanted to stun the world with their two blows on the fronts. They “took” Grozny and began the general assault on Stalingrad. They already bombarded Stalingrad with leaflets along with mugs and lighters: “Today we took Grozny and now we can remove our bombers from there to please you with them.” But all their attempts were unsuccessful - the Germans were not allowed to Grozny, they were stopped on the Terek and thrown back.

... The Hitlerites, realizing that they could not see Grozny oil, and could not go further than Malgobek, decided to wipe Grozny off the face of the earth, raise his plants to the air, light fuel tanks, break oil pipelines ... The bombing of Grozny began .. .

October 10, 1942 at 14:10 from a height of 4000 meters, the first massive Luftwaffe raid on Grozny and its industrial facilities in the Stalin (now Zavodsky) district of Grozny was carried out from different sides. The weather was clear, with visibility up to 10 km. Armada " Junkers Ju 88 " and " Heinkel He 111 ", consisting of 85 aircraft, accompanied by 30-40 fighter jets, diving to 200-300 meters dropped high-explosive and incendiary bombs. During the first massive enemy air raid, 15 oil refineries, 139 reservoirs with oil products, 22 industrial and utility buildings and residential buildings, a millionaire barn filled with fuel oil were set on fire simultaneously ... High-explosive and fragmentation bombs, as well as incendiary bombs, were bombarded from 14:10 to 23: 30, with 10-15 minute breaks.

... No matter how hard the anti-aircraft gunners tried, no matter how they shot down the enemy’s aircraft, there were no counting them, many bombers, dropping bombs anywhere, got away, but many managed to bring their deadly load ...

By re-bombing two days later, on October 12, 34 tanks, 2 fuel oil barns, a receiving station, tanks with finished oil products, the 1st oil refinery, the oil factory of the 53rd workshop, the thermal power plant, the 8th cube battery Cracking plant, several industrial utility and residential buildings. In total, FAB - about 657 pieces, weighing from 50 to 1000 kg, ZAB - about 800 pieces were dropped on objects. weighing from 1 to 25 kg, a large number of fragmentation bombs, which it was not possible to take into account. Through the destroyed fences, flaming oil flowed into the city, there was a danger of flooding the city with burning oil. ^[3] Black puffs of smoke and soot covered the city from the sun, in half an hour the day turned into night, the townspeople for a long time lost sunlight ...

In the very heat of the seventh tank farm, the chief of the 2nd Militarized Fire Brigade Nikolai KAZANSKY was with the fighters. From a direct hit, two tanks blazed, oil burned around them. Having completed the combat deployment, firefighters began to extinguish the spilled oil product, pushing the flame away from neighboring tanks. The protection of the two burning tanks was led by the head of the Militarized Fire Command No. 2 (VPK-2) Ivan Markovich MAZYAR, who arrived with his fighters, repeatedly leading the attacks on fire. An hour later, the fire was eliminated. But at this time, the park was bombarded again. Two other tanks were destroyed and set on fire, a gushing burning oil product rushed to the tanks that had just been extinguished. The burning oil also got into the sewer and went through it through the park. fragmentation bombs disabled part of the fire hoses. tank protection temporarily stopped ...

The fire came close to tanks No. 163 and No. 165. The first from overheating "shot" into the sky with a column of fire. The tank 165 should have suffered the same fate. But the assistant commander of the department, Ivan Tsygankov, who suddenly found himself on the roof of the tank, came to his defense. Dousing himself with water and skillfully maneuvering the barrel, he independently entered into battle with fire. tongues of flame violently attacked the brave, but he did not let go of the trunk until the formidable element obeyed.

Komsomol member Nina KHACHATURYANTS, who was cut off from the exits by an avalanche of fire, was not taken aback. a courageous girl with a multi-kilogram barrel in her hands for three hours waged a stubborn struggle with the elements.

Squeezing the fire from the tanks, with the barrel in his hands, assistant commander of the department Semyon Mitrofanovich PRILIPCO walked through the puddles of oil ...

Through the hatch, tank No. 163 continued to burn. A nightmare was needed to cover the neck of the hatch, but there was no nightmare. Then the head of the guard, Pavel Grigoryevich Fomenko, brought out a mattress stuffed with wool from the surviving utility room, with difficulty reached the conical roof of the tank to the hatch and threw it onto the flame escaping from it, pressing it with his own body weight for tightness.

The battle with fire in the seventh oil park began on October 10 at 14:30 and ended on October 11 at 12:30. By this time, all the fires in the park were eliminated.

After the first bombings, four fire engine pumps were sent to the tank farm of the 53rd workshop with a full combat calculation. Two tanks with aviation gasoline burned here. gasoline vapors ignited in sewer wells, in gate valve assemblies and in the boxes of the foam nozzles of the fire fighting system.

The flame temperature was so high that the water in the reservoir, located 40 meters from the fire, began to boil. The primary task was to protect neighboring gasoline tanks from fire and extinguish the burning oil product bottling, while preparing a foamy attack on the burning tank. The commander of the VPK-1 department, Vladimir Grigoryevich MALKOV, by personal example carried away an attack on a burning tank and pouring other shavers. For two hours, under the explosions of bombs in the inferno heat, the MALKOV branch worked.

Skillfully and decisively, water and foam attacks were carried out by the ordinary fighter POTIHONIN. There was a moment when after a bomb explosion the fire engine pump suddenly stopped - the driver was seriously injured. But that was only the moment. The place of the driver was quickly taken by the guard chief GUBAREV. Uninterrupted water supply continued.

The enemy plane dropped 3 HE bombs at oil park No. 5. Five tanks with oil products flared up at once. 4 auto pumps with full combat calculations arrived on fire. They were led by VPO-2 political instructor Maxim Lazorevich LUNOCHKIN. The fire spread throughout the territory with lightning speed and began to approach the neighboring oil park No. 4. And in this raging sea of ​​fire, the fascist vulture added two more fugaski. An outburst occurred from one tank and a burning avalanche, hanging in the air, collapsed onto a fighting fire engine, which stood on a fence of water from a reservoir ...

A minute confusion was created. But the call of the political instructor: “Forward, follow me!” - carried away the military calculations in the attack on the fire. For several hours, the protection of the reservoirs of Park No. 4 lasted. I had to call a team of excavators to block the path of the burning bottling with an embankment, to fill up the nodes of the valves and covers of the hydraulic sewer wells with earth. Continuous or atomized jets of water were fed into the burning tanks. The fire was eliminated. Tank Park No. 4 was protected and saved.

In a similar situation when extinguishing a fire at the plant number 7 was the political instructor VPK-2 Mikhail Leontyevich CHERNYAVSKY. His cry: “Not a step back!” - was heroically executed. The politruk was shell-shocked from a bomb explosion and suffered serious burns, but continued to direct the fire extinguishing until it was eliminated.

The thermal power station named after the Comintern was also blazing. The assistant to the chief of the second fire brigade, Pyotr Vasilyevich GRISHAEV, led the firefighters into a decisive attack on the fire. Fighters, perfectly understanding. what does it mean to leave the city covered in smoke in pitch darkness, its enterprises, which have switched to a military spirit, have boldly thrown themselves into the hell ...

The blast wave twice threw from combat positions the assistant commander Mikhail Emelyanovich SAGAYDACHNY. But he rose and with the same obstinacy continued to fight the fire ...

Fighter VPK-1 Evdokia Ivanovna Chuprina was thrown back by a blast wave and bombarded with earth. However, after a few seconds the girl already took the fire barrel and for three hours did not let it out of her hands ...

There was a titanic struggle with the fire element and in oil tank No. 13. the commander of the VPK-1 branch, Mikhail Andreevich YAROVOY, prepared and organized people to tame the fire, but the attack was unsuccessful. Tens of holes from fragmentation bombs threw tight jets of burning gasoline from the tank. A risky but only right decision came. Mikhail Andreevich climbed onto the burning tank and began to drive into the holes the checks that the soldiers made and handed him. His lips cracked from the heat, his clothes smashed, but patience and perseverance won. An example of YAROVOI was followed by a fighter of the same unit Alexei Petrovich GULOV. To take holes in the second tank, he took any material that came to hand ...

At 14:15, German aviation bombed at the Grozny station, a material warehouse caught fire, into the territory of which 25 incendiary bombs fell, which caused 4 fires at once. Residential buildings on the Krupskaya and Boevaya substation streets, a boarding school, and a stable burned. The workshop car, train depot, railway club caught fire.

“The second wave of bombers in the same area dropped, apart from large incendiary - high-explosive and fragmentation bombs ..."

Foci of fires simultaneously arose in the workshops of the railway school, in a number of residential buildings. At already burning facilities, additional damage was done. Fires intensified. The railway club was especially badly damaged. Bombs pierced its light ceilings, exploding in the auditorium, foyer and on stage. The club flashed in four places.

By the time of the raid, the motor vehicles of the fire brigade of the railway were dispersed and occupied places, according to the city-wide operational plan. After receiving a message about the fires, the head of the military-industrial complex of the Grozny station KURCHINSKY sent a group of fighters to extinguish the material warehouse. They, with the help of working workshops, put on fire cranes with sleeves. After 20 minutes, the fire in the warehouses was eliminated.

Another fire brigade with a hydraulic control extinguished the burning outbuilding of a residential building. Fires and sunburns in depots, workshops and other facilities were relatively quickly eliminated ...

After that, all available fire extinguishing forces and equipment were thrown to extinguish the club. Here the attic rooms of the central part of the building, the scenes of the large and small halls were already burning. Quickly installed car pumps on the hydrants of the city network, laid lines, but ... there was no water. One car pump turned to the hydrant of the railway water supply, located near the fire brigade building. The second was installed on the reservoir of the material warehouse, the third and fourth were put on the pumping of water from the reservoir located in the courtyard of residential 5-storey buildings. Two fire trains were also involved. The calculation of the first promptly laid a hose line and began to extinguish the fire in the designated area. The second - stood in reserve. When water was consumed from the first train, he left behind it, and the calculation of the second train was connected to the hose line of the first. So they alternated.

By 23:00 the fire in the attic of the central part of the club was eliminated, but the reservoirs of the material warehouse and 5 floors were devastated, and the railway water supply began to work intermittently. At this time, the roof collapsed over the stage and the auditorium, piers on the 4th floor were burning from the side of the central foyer.

I need water! And firemen, breaking a fence that encloses the club’s territory from the Sunzha River, built a platform for automobile pumps on its shore. The fight against fire resumed, and the elements were subdued. It was eight in the evening on October 12.

The garrison of the fire brigade of Grozny, with the active assistance of oil workers, the NKVD troops, localized and eliminated fires at cracking plants, barns filled with fuel oil, on manifolds and pumping stations, at the Grozny station and in residential buildings ...

Air raids lasted until October 15, 1942. In total, about 9 thousand bombs were dropped on the city. Firefighters had to extinguish more than 250 fires that occurred simultaneously.

But the bombs stopped tearing. A third of fascist bombers found their cemetery near the walls of the impregnable city of oil - it was a feat of Soviet anti-aircraft gunners and pilots ...

The fighters of the fire front and their voluntary assistants won! They have become a symbol of valor and glory.

The heroic city survived. In a short period of time, he restored his industry and began to give his products to the front.

In the battle with fire, many heroes were injured, 15 fighters of the fire front were killed, it was not only Grozny, but also Pyatigorsk firemen who were evacuated to Grozny when the Germans attacked the CMS. They were equipped with a separate fire unit of the garrison. Their mass grave is located in the central city cemetery, in the area of ​​the cannery.

In honor of those killed in 1944, an obelisk was erected at the building of the fire brigade on Industrial Street. ^[four]

At the request of the head of the Fire Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Chechen Academy of Sciences of the Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (1966-1988), Scherbino Anatoly Vasilievich (1930-2014), who arrived at the Academy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR (FIPTiB) when he arrived at the post of head of the fire department of the republic in 1966 and headed it before leaving for a well-deserved rest in 1988, it was decided to install a monument instead of the obelisk.

The idea arose in 1967 - the year of the 25th anniversary of the massive bombing by the fascist aircraft of Grozny, its crafts and factories during the Great Patriotic War (October 10-15, 1942).

On July 7, 1967, the bureau of the Chechen-Ingush regional committee of the CPSU issued a decree on the construction of a new monument in honor of firefighters who died at a military post during the defense of Grozny. The old obelisk was dismantled and in its place, by the order of the Lenin V.I. Oil Refinery, under the direction of the sculptor Ruslan Izrailovich MAMILOV, the construction of a new monument began. The author performed the sculptural composition in two stages, first a small copy, then a full-size one. The casting was performed at the Monumentskulptura Leningrad plant, installation was performed by the SMU of the Grozneftekhimremontstroy trust. The opening of the monument took place on November 5, 1968 - the first monument to the firefighters in the USSR, with eternal flame.

The monument is a figure of a firefighter who tames fire. In front of the composition from the “earth” stands the stabilizer of the enemy air bomb, from which the flame breaks out. A fighter-fireman (he is depicted with a naked torso) above the bomb, leaning his left knee on the beam-beam, making incredible efforts, twists it with both hands, as if taking a raging flame into the ring. The composition symbolizes the will and power of the people to eliminate the fire. At the same time, the Eternal Flame represents the feat of firefighters who died during the Great Patriotic War.

The composition is made of cast iron, initially the color was made "under copper". The sculpture is bolted to a reinforced concrete pedestal with a trapezoidal shape measuring 4.5 × 1.5 × 0.9 meters. The pedestal is gray, plastered.

Initially, a cast metal board 0.78 × 0.6 meters in size was attached to the front of the pedestal on the right side, on which the text was carved:

“To firefighters who died in extinguishing fires from Nazi air raids on Grozny on October 10-15, 1942

SHAFOROSTOV I.G., RUBTSOV P.E., RUD G.T., Perepelitsa S. Ya., KOROBEYNIKOV F.F., NIKITENKO A.A., LAGUNOV Ya. Z., DEDUSENKO N.D., PYLTSIN P P., OLEINIKOV I. S., VASILCHENKO I. B., KAPSHUK T. I., MATIENKO K. U., LASHININ K. N., RYZHAKOV G. P. "

A lawn adjoined the rear of the pedestal, blue spruce trees were planted at the monument.

On March 6, 1970, the Council of Ministers of the Chechen-Ingush Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic adopted a monument for state protection. ^{[4] [5] [6]}

In January 1995, during the fighting, the monument was damaged, the Eternal Flame was disabled, the memorial plaque was lost. Destroyed nearby is the former building of the fire station.

In the 2000s, the monument was painted silver, with the exception of the protruding stabilizer of the bomb, which received a red color.

On July 13, 2012, the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Emergencies of Russia for the Chechen Republic established a new memorial plaque. The board is installed in the central part of the pedestal. ^[7] Later, the pedestal was lined with marble slabs.

Now, next to the monument, a new building of the city Fire Station No. 2 (ПЧ-2) was built ...