Consequences of the explosion of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station in 1941. The myth about the “victims of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station”

On August 18, 1941, the Soviet leadership, in panic, ordered the explosion of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station dam, along which refugees and retreating Soviet troops were walking at that time. The explosion created a giant wave that killed several thousand more Soviet citizens and military personnel.
This myth is used to “illustrate” the inhumanity of the Soviet leadership and its disregard for the lives of its own citizens.

Examples of using

Reality

Crossing 9th. and the 18th Army across the Dnieper.

Brief summary of the myth. On August 18, 1941, the Soviet leadership, in panic, ordered the explosion of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station dam, along which refugees and retreating Soviet troops were walking at that time. The explosion created a giant wave that killed several thousand more Soviet citizens and military personnel. The myth is used to “illustrate” the inhumanity of the Soviet leadership and its disregard for the lives of its own citizens. Examples of use “By order of the commander of the South-Western direction Semyon Budyonny, sappers of the 157th NKVD regiment undermine the Dnieper hydroelectric station. The explosion only partially destroyed the dam, but a huge wall of water rushed downstream. According to eyewitnesses, the wave height was several tens of meters. It destroyed not only German crossings and a relatively small number of enemy troops. Giant whirlpools cut off and literally sucked in our two retreating combined arms armies and a cavalry corps. Only a few scattered groups were able to swim out, then they were surrounded and captured. The wave hit the Zaporozhye coastal strip and columns of refugees. In addition to troops and refugees, many people who worked there, the local civilian population, and hundreds of thousands of livestock died in the floodplains and coastal zone. Dozens of ships and their crews perished in the catastrophic flow” (1). “Then, during the retreat of our troops, it was decided to blow up the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station. Only a few knew about secret encryption. But the operation did not go as planned. The charge was not calculated; as a result, a gap was formed in the body of the dam 5 times larger than the calculated one. A powerful stream of water poured into the lower reaches of the Dnieper. A gigantic wave washed away all coastal villages with local residents, and destroyed the pontoon crossings of our troops. As a result of the flood, the soldiers of two combined arms armies and a cavalry corps, for the most part, were surrounded and captured. All work to prepare the explosion was carried out in secret from the front command, since the Front’s Military Council did not give permission for this. A breakthrough wave about 25 meters high rushed down the river bed. The gigantic stream destroyed all coastal villages along its path, burying several thousand civilians. Two combined arms armies and a cavalry corps were cut off during the crossing. Some of the soldiers managed to cross the Dnieper in difficult conditions, but most of the military personnel were surrounded and captured” (2). “No one was warned about the planned explosion of the Dnieper dam, either at the dam itself, along which at that time military transports and troops were moving, which were retreating to the left bank of the Dnieper, or the population and institutions of the city of Zaporozhye - 10-12 kilometers from the hydroelectric power station downstream of the Dnieper . Also, the military units located down from Zaporozhye in the Dnieper flood plains were not warned. Military transports and people who were moving along the dam at that time naturally died. An almost thirty-meter avalanche of water swept through the Dnieper floodplain, flooding everything in its path. Dozens of ships, along with their crews, perished in that terrible stream. The explosion of the dam sharply raised the water level in the lower reaches of the Dnieper, where at that time the crossing of the troops of the 2nd Cavalry Corps, the 18th and 9th Armies, which were retreating near Nikolaev, began. These troops were “cut off” during the crossing, partly replenished the number of troops that were surrounded and captured, and partly managed to cross in incredibly difficult conditions, abandoning artillery and military equipment. They said that approximately 20,000 Red Army soldiers died in the floodplains at that time - no one thought to count exactly how many. In addition to the troops, tens of thousands of livestock and many people who were at work there at that time died in the floodplains” (3). “Then, from the huge wave caused by the explosion, from 75 to 100,000 unwarned residents and about 20,000 Red Army soldiers, forgotten by the command and not evacuated, died” (4). Reality It is better to divide the analysis of this myth into several parts, and we can start with the fact that supposedly no one knew about the impending explosion of the dam, including the command of the Soviet troops defending it. The explosion of the DneproGES dam was carried out on the basis of a code message from Stalin and the Chief of the General Staff of the Red Army Shaposhnikov to the command of the Southern Front. To carry out this operation, the head of the engineering troops of the Red Army, General Kotlyar, sent an experienced demolitionist, Lieutenant Colonel Boris Epov. To communicate with the front engineering department, he was paired with a technical department specialist, Lieutenant Colonel Petrovsky. This is what former Deputy Chairman of the USSR Council of People's Commissars M.G. writes in his memoirs. Pervukhin: “In the afternoon, when the laying of explosives was almost completed, a representative of the front headquarters arrived, who handed the representatives of the military command at the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station a telegram from the Commander-in-Chief of the Southwestern Direction, Marshal S. M. Budyonny, specifying the date of the explosion. It stated that in case of danger of the dam being occupied by the Germans, it should be put out of action. It was getting dark, and the soldiers crossed the turna to the left bank, since it was no longer possible to pass along the dam from above, because it was under heavy enemy artillery fire. The moment came when the commander of the military unit defending the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station closed the contacts of the battery, and a dull explosion shook the dam.” And here is what the direct organizer of the explosion, Lieutenant Colonel Epov, writes in his memoirs: “The chief of staff of the front, General Kharitonov, who arrived along with commander Shifrin, gave instructions to carry out the destruction after the Germans reached the right bank of the Dnieper. The right to complete the task will be the departure of the NKVD security regiment and Lieutenant Colonel A.F., specially allocated for communications. Petrovsky. By the end of the day on August 18, the Germans reached the right bank of the Dnieper and began shelling the left bank; The NKVD regiment also retreated to the left bank and the regiment commander, retreating together with his liaison Lieutenant Colonel Petrovsky, gave the command to carry out the destruction, which I, together with the attached junior lieutenants, carried out.” Thus, as we see, the command of the Southern Front was not only aware of the impending explosion, but also actively took part in its preparation. By the way, the memories of direct witnesses of the explosion also put an end to the chilling story about the crossing troops and refugees blown up along with the dam. Now let's consider the fate of two armies and a cavalry corps, allegedly washed away by the resulting wave. “On the evening of August 18, the outskirts of Zaporozhye were filled with the sound of a huge explosion. The Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station dam was blown up with a twenty-ton charge of TNT. As a result of the explosion of the bridge and dam on the island of Khortitsa, an infantry regiment was cut off, which successfully defended itself and then crossed to the eastern shore. The explosion of the dam sharply raised the water level in the lower reaches of the Dnieper, where at that time the crossing of the retreating troops of the 2nd Cavalry Corps, the 18th and 9th armies began.

On August 17, the Commander-in-Chief of the Southwestern Direction authorized the withdrawal of troops from the Southern Front to the Dnieper in order to organize a strong defense at the line of this major water barrier. On the evening of the same day, combat order No. 0077/OP was issued by the commander of the Southern Front troops, which determined the procedure for the withdrawal of troops of the two armies from the line of the Ingulets River beyond the Dnieper. The 2nd Cavalry Corps was supposed to retreat to the Nikopol - Nizhny Rogachik area. The 18th Army was withdrawn to the eastern bank of the Dnieper with the task of taking up defense in the Nikopol - Nizhny Rogachik - Kakhovka sector. Accordingly, the 9th Army is in the Kakhovka-Kherson sector. The withdrawal was to be covered by strong rearguards and air operations. After the crossing, the newly formed 30th Cavalry Division was transferred to the 18th Army, and the commander of the 9th Army was ordered to subordinate the 296th Infantry Division. Thus, all the armies of the front one way or another received secondary divisions under their command. On the section from Nikopol to Kherson, the width of the Dnieper is on average about one and a half kilometers. Cumbersome pontoon parks were lost on the roads and in battles during the retreat. For example, the 2nd Cavalry Corps was forced to leave its pontoon park on the Southern Bug River to cross the retreating units of the 18th Army. The remains of the pontoon-bridge property preserved in the armies could only be used for the construction of light ferries. The ships of the Dnieper River Shipping Company came to the aid of the troops. Barges and floating piers were quickly adapted for ferries; everything that could be used for the crossing was mobilized. As a result, three ferry crossings were built: 1. for the 2nd Cavalry Corps - three ferries on wooden boats near Nizhny Rogachik (for the 5th Cavalry Division, horses had to be transported by swimming), a towing steamer with a barge - near Bolshaya Lepatikha (for the 9th 1st Cavalry Division); 2. for formations of the 18th Army - a ferry on barges and two ferries on improvised means in the Kochkarovka area; 3. for formations of the 9th Army - two ferries in the Western Kairy area, three ferries on barges in the Kakhovka area and two ferries near Tyaginka. The troops of two armies and a cavalry corps began crossing on the morning of August 18. The strictest timing, precise organization of loading and unloading, and round-the-clock operation of tugboats made it possible to transport the bulk of the troops to the eastern shore by the morning of August 22” (5). Now let's look at the map. The distance from the DneproGES dam to the village of Nizhny Rogachik, where the 2nd Cavalry Corps crossed, is approximately 125 km. , and to the village. Velikaya Lepetikha - approximately 145 km. To Kachkarovka, where the 18th Army was crossing, this distance is approximately 160 km. Cairo, Kakhovka and Tyaginka, where units of the 9th Army crossed, are located even further along the Dnieper. Any person familiar with physics as part of at least a school course will easily understand that there can be no talk of any “thirty-meter waves” at such distances.

It is not surprising that the order of the headquarters of the 9th Army dated August 21 says: ORDER TO THE TROOPS OF THE 9th ARMY August 21, 1941 No. 00173 Forced to retreat from the Dniester to the Dnieper, the 9th Army by August 21 successfully crossed the Dnieper in difficult conditions and is fixed on the left bank of the latter. The task of the army in this period is to put its combat units, its rear, headquarters and command and control facilities in order. Having replenished its ranks, the army must be ready for decisive blows to defeat and destroy the presumptuous enemy. ...Commanders of the 9th Army Colonel General Cherevichenko Member of the Military Council 9 A Corps Commissar Kolobyakov Nashtarm 9 Major General Bodin (6) This is also evidenced by the directive of the command of the Southern Front: Directive of the commander of the troops of the Southern Front No. 0083/op for defense on the left bank of the river. Dnieper (August 21, 1941) ... Fifth. 18 A - composition of 176, 164, 169 SD and 96 GSD and 30 CD. The task is to defend the east. bank of the river Dnieper, firmly hold the crossings and Nikopol district in your hands, prevent a breakthrough in the direction of Nikopol, Melitopol. Have at least one infantry division in reserve, closer to the right flank. The border on the left is (legal) Bereznigovata, (legal) Gornostaevka, (legal) Melitopol. Sixth. 9 A - composition of 51, 150, 74, 30 and 296 rifle divisions. The task is to defend the east. bank of the river Dnieper, firmly hold the tete-de-pont at Berislav and Kherson, prevent a breakthrough in the direction of Perekop. Have at least one rifle division closer to the right flank in reserve. The border on the left is Sokologornaya, farm. Askania Nova, Skadovsk. (7) Apparently, the basis for rumors about “armies washed away by the wave” was the fate of the 6th and 12th armies, which died two weeks earlier in the Uman cauldron. In addition to archival documents, there is a publication that examines the physics of the process, which proves that there can be no talk of any tsunami with a height of 20 or even 30 meters: The height difference at the Dnieper hydroelectric station is 37 meters. The volume of the pressure reservoir is 3.3 cubic meters. km. The height of the dam is 60 meters, the pressure front of the reservoir is 1200 meters. Judging by the photograph, a cofferdam of about 110 meters was blown up (i.e. less than 10% of the front!), and not at the very base, and not even at the water’s edge, but 15-20 meters higher (by eye). In total, a gap with an area of ​​at most 110x20 m was formed. Let’s take the maximum level difference - 20 meters. Most likely, the wave height was 60% of the drop - 12 meters. Immediately after the explosion, the breakthrough wave, 12 meters high and with a maximum width of 110 meters, begins to dissipate radially across the 1200 meter wide floodplain at an approximate speed of 70 to 90 km/h. After about 20 seconds, when the wave reaches the shores of Khortitsa Island, it is 1.5 meters, decreasing even more with time and downstream. The approximate speed of water rising downstream is 4 to 5 centimeters per minute. Elementary calculations show that the maximum wave height after 20 seconds was 1.5 meters. But not 30 meters - as the Ukrainian Nazis and their pocket historians propagate. The rapid rise of water towards the floodplains amounted to a maximum of 1 meter, and was more like a flood. As a result, from the point of view of the science of physics, the statement of some “historians” about a thirty-meter tsunami is delirium of an inflamed consciousness. ... And then here’s what it turned out to be. The article by Vladimir Linikov generally says that the drainage spans were opened on August 18, before the explosion. The power plant employees drained water from the reservoir, which means the water level was even lower, which means the wave height at Khortytsia was definitely no more than 1.5 meters. In addition, due to the release of water from the reservoir at the beginning of the day on August 18, the water level below the dam was already elevated - estimated at 0.5 meters. And the spans were blown up around 20-00...

From the first months of the war, the Soviet leadership tried to use “scorched earth” tactics during the retreat. That is, to destroy the entire infrastructure without any concern for the future fate of the population who could not evacuate. One of the most brutal manifestations of this tactic was the mining of the Dnieper hydroelectric dam in Zaporozhye. On August 18, 1941, at about 20:00, after a breakthrough by German troops, it was blown up.

The detonation task was carried out by military engineers authorized by the General Staff of the Red Army with 20 tons of explosives - ammonal, as a result of which a gigantic hole was formed in the dam, which already provoked a wave 7-12 meters high, which practically washed away the coastal city strip, the floodplain of the island. Khortitsa and safely reached the neighboring Ukrainian cities - Nikopol and Marganets. No one was warned about the planned explosion of the Dnieper dam, either on the dam itself, along which at that time military transports and troops were moving, which were retreating to the left bank of the Dnieper, or the population and institutions of the city of Zaporozhye - 10-12 kilometers from the hydroelectric power station downstream of the Dnieper. Also, the military units located down from Zaporozhye in the Dnieper floodplains were not warned, although the telephone connection at that time on the Left Bank functioned normally. In the USSR, the version about “hostile sabotage by the German occupiers” was widespread.

Military transports and people who were moving along the dam at that time naturally died. As a result of the explosion of the bridge and dam on the island of Khortitsa, an infantry regiment, which was being transported at that time to the eastern shore, was cut off.

From the memoirs of the German architect Rudolf Wolters, who in 1932-33. took part in the industrialization of the USSR, and 10 years later returned to the occupied USSR to restore the economy: “...During the retreat, the Russians blew up a dam in the middle at a width of 175 meters. 3,000 refugees who were on the dam at that time were carried away by the current. Water masses 5-6 meters thick fall from a 15-meter height through a gap and lower the water level so that the pier in the upper reaches is on dry land, and there is not enough pressure to rotate the turbines. The locks also remain dry after the explosion, so shipping is paralyzed. Not only the dam, but the machinery was mostly destroyed. During the retreat, the Russians turned off the central lubrication system, so that the machines instantly overheated and caught fire. What then were the machine rooms, turbines and generators was a masterful work of destruction. And today the cracked ones are visible reinforced concrete walls, melted iron parts; everything is rendered unusable..."

An avalanche of water swept through the Dnieper floodplain, flooding everything in its path. The entire lower part of Zaporozhye with huge reserves of various goods, military materials and tens of thousands of tons of food products and other property was demolished in just an hour. Dozens of ships, along with their crews, perished in that terrible stream. The force of the wave generated by the explosion of the DneproGES dam was such that the Volochaevka monitor was thrown ashore and could then be used as a defensive structure only on land.

In the floodplain zone of the island of Khortitsa and the Dnieper floodplains, tens of kilometers to Nikopol and further, military units were in positions. The explosion of the dam sharply raised the water level in the lower reaches of the Dnieper, where at that time the crossing of the troops of the 2nd Cavalry Corps, the 18th and 9th Armies, which were retreating near Nikolaev, began. These troops were “cut off” during the crossing, partly replenished the number of troops that were surrounded and captured, and partly managed to cross in incredibly difficult conditions, abandoning artillery and military equipment.

It is believed that approximately 20 thousand Red Army soldiers died in the floodplains at that time (there is no exact data). Local residents buried the bodies near the railway bridge on Khlyastikovy Street. In addition to the troops, tens of thousands of livestock and many people who were at work there at that time died in the floodplains.

According to a combat report dated August 19 from the headquarters of the Southern Front to the Supreme Commander-in-Chief, the explosion of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station dam was carried out by the head of the Military Engineering Department of the headquarters of the Southern Front, Lieutenant Colonel A. Petrovsky and a representative of the General Staff, the head of a separate scientific research military engineering institute (Moscow) military engineer 1 rank B. Epov. They acted according to the orders of the General Staff of the Red Army, having received permission to blow up the dam in case of emergency.

It is almost impossible to determine the exact number of deaths; available sources allow us to estimate only approximate losses of the warring parties. The German command claimed that it had lost 1.5 thousand of its soldiers.

On the Soviet side, most of the region’s 200 thousand militia, an infantry division (one of its regiments remained on Khortitsa Island), an NKVD regiment, two artillery regiments, and smaller units were in the zone affected by the flood. The personnel of these units total more than 20 thousand soldiers. In addition, on the night of August 18, in a wide strip from Nikopol to Kakhovka and Kherson, the withdrawal of two combined arms armies and a cavalry corps began to the left bank. This is another 12 divisions (150-170 thousand soldiers and officers). In addition to the military, residents of the low-lying streets of Zaporozhye, villages on both banks of the Dnieper, and refugees suffered from the sudden flood. The estimated number of people in the affected area is 450 thousand people. Based on these data, the number of dead Red Army soldiers, militias and civilians on the Soviet side in historical studies is estimated from 20-30 thousand to 75-100 thousand.

The Germans, with the help of Wehrmacht engineers and the forces of Soviet workers, managed to restore the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station; they paid for the work in Reichsmarks. It is believed that in the late autumn of 1943, the Germans, during their retreat, also attempted to blow up the Dnieper Hydroelectric Dam. At the same time, the plan to destroy the dam was not implemented and it was not destroyed, since Soviet sappers managed to damage some of the wires to the detonators. And yet, either as a result of Soviet bombing or the Germans, the hydroelectric station, the roadway of the dam, the outer bridge and the connecting abutment on the right bank were destroyed. The Soviet leadership made the decision to restore the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station in 1944 - and it was mainly women who restored it, clearing the rubble of crushed concrete, which weighed a quarter of a million tons, manually in Soviet style. They had the same traditional Soviet tools - a wheelbarrow, a pickaxe and a shovel.

Sources:
1. Khmelnitsky D.S. Nazi propaganda against the USSR. Materials and comments. 1939-1945.
2. Central archive of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation. - F.228. - Op.754. - Ref.60. - Arc.95.
3. Moroko V.N. Dneproges: black August 1941.
4. Scientific works of the Faculty of History of Zaporozhye National University. - M.: ZNU, 2010. - VIP.XXIX. - P.200-201.
5. Rummo A.V. Tell people the truth.
6. Sociological research. - Moscow, 1990. - No.9. - P.128.

First of all, let's say why it was necessary to blow up the “pearl of Soviet energy,” the third most powerful station in the world. Everything is simple here: the dam is a bridge along which German tanks could have rolled into Zaporozhye on August 19th. 22 enterprises of union importance, including an engine-building plant (the future Motor Sich), would go to the Reich economy. And the Wehrmacht, having accumulated strength, would quickly take in pincers the 18th army of General Andrei Smirnov crossing the Dnieper. The Southern Front crumbles, and the Germans immediately reach Perekop.

There was a chance.

In the “War Diary” of the former Chief of the General Staff of the German Ground Forces, Franz Halder, it is described that “August 19, 1941. 59th day of the war... Enemy aircraft are intensively attacking our advanced advancing units in the Dnieper bend. The 9th Panzer Division reached the area 1 km west of the dam near Zaporozhye. The 14th Panzer Division broke into the enemy bridgehead near Zaporozhye.”

But it was broken by soldiers of the 3rd and 6th batteries of the 16th anti-aircraft artillery air defense regiment, who detained the enemy column on the right bank. The clock donated to the city by the destroyed third battery, which entered into battle with tanks at four in the morning, turned into the same month and a half for evacuation.

In the report on losses for August 18, 1941, there are notes that are offensive in their irreparability: “Lieutenant Zakharchenko Pavel Anatolyevich, commander of the control platoon... was left on the battlefield. Red Army soldier David Solomonovich Margalitashvili, instrument operator... was left on the battlefield.”

With their lives they ensured the coordinated and rhythmic work of labor collectives and the railway.

By 1937, Zaporozhye produced 60% of the country's aluminum, 60% of ferroalloys, 100% of magnesium, 20% of rolled steel. To save the equipment, in August-September, at least 600 wagons left from here to the east every day, and on some days - about 900. Only for the removal of one Zaporizhstal plant, 8 thousand of them were required.

And for the anti-aircraft gunners it all ended around 15:00 that day.

At the end of the battle, a dozen surviving soldiers of the 3rd battery, led by the fire platoon commander, junior lieutenant Pavel Chumakov, retreated to the hydroelectric station. From the 6th battery, stationed near the village of Baburka (now an urban area) and defending together with a battalion of NKVD riflemen, people retreated to Khortitsa.

At that time there was a real doomsday there - across the two bridges that connected the island with both banks, a crowd of people poured in - a mixture of military, civilians, vehicles and cattle. Taking advantage of the bustle, the Germans also poured onto the island, but did not have time to cross the Old Dnieper - the second bridge was blown up. The Kichkassky bridge upstream was also destroyed.

Only the hydroelectric power station remained.

First, the turbines were rendered unusable. Reich Minister of Armaments and Ammunition, Inspector General of Roads, Water and Energy Resources Albert Speer, who visited Zaporozhye in 1942, noted that “during their retreat, the Russians disabled the equipment in a very simple and remarkable way: by switching the lubrication distributor when the turbines were in full operation. Deprived of lubrication, the machines became hot and literally ate themselves, turning into a pile of unusable scrap metal. A very effective means of destruction and with just a simple turn of the handle by one person!”

A huge hole was punched in the dam itself.

By agreement at the very top, the preparation of the explosion was carried out by Boris Epov, a major expert in sapper work, who was part of the commission at Soyuzvzryvprom for the destruction of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior, a teacher at the Academy of Engineering with extensive experience, and the author of many scientific works.

Special planes delivered everything necessary to destroy the dam, the bridge across the forechamber and the turbine hall. The necessary instructions were given to the head of the engineering troops of the Southern Front, Colonel Aron Shifrin, and member of the front’s military council, Trofim Kolomiets. At that time, the head of DneproEnergo was preparing and evacuating the station’s generators.

As Epov himself stated in his autobiography, the chief of staff of the front, General Fyodor Kharitonov, who arrived with Shifrin, gave instructions to wait until the last minute.

“The right to carry out the task will be the withdrawal of the NKVD security regiment and Lieutenant Colonel A.F. Petrovsky, specially allocated for communications. By the end of the day on August 18, the Germans reached the right bank of the Dnieper and began shelling the left bank; The NKVD regiment also retreated to the left bank, and the regiment commander, retreating along with his liaison Lieutenant Colonel Petrovsky, gave the command to carry out the destruction, which I, together with the attached junior lieutenants, carried out. As a result of the explosion, about 100 meters along its length were torn out in the body of the dam (out of the total length of the dam of 600 m),” writes the engineer-colonel, who then spent ten very unpleasant days in the front-line SMERSH.

And since this someone turned out to be the head of the political department of the front, General Alexander Zaporozhets, the only one who was not in the army at the right moment, the bomber’s weapons were taken away, he was accused of treason and they began to find out who gave the sabotage task. Only when the head of the Main Military Engineering Directorate of the Red Army, Major General Leonty Kotlyar, came to Stalin, was Epov released with an apology and even “taken measures to put things in order.”

From that moment on, a legend was born about a ten-meter wave, which eventually grew into a thirty-meter wave, “killing a hundred thousand Ukrainians.”

The myth covered the units defending on Khortitsa with a terrible tsunami (although there were already Germans there), drowned 20 thousand Red Army soldiers in the floodplains and at crossings, then hung them “over bushes and trees”, buried “dozens of ships along with their crews” in the abyss.

Copy-pastes that have been wandering around the media for decades are constantly adding new details.

Over time, it became clear that “giant whirlpools cut off and literally sucked in our two retreating combined arms armies and a cavalry corps.” According to the myth-makers, only a few were able to swim out and were immediately captured. But the coastal villages did not float anywhere; they were covered with water, which at the same time devoured the “columns of refugees.”

In general, an apocalypse, the example of which is very convenient to show the inhuman, cannibalistic nature of the Soviet regime. For added beauty, the same NKVD regiment that “died in a dam explosion” is added to the dead. A little more - and in such stories the wave will reach the shores of Turkey, destroying something ancient from among the world's heritage.

Only all this did not happen.

The Dnieper actually overflowed so much that it flooded the outlying streets of Zaporozhye.

Writer Oleg Zoin in “An Ordinary Novel” says that tram No. 5 did not run from Freedom Square to the Pristan because the tram tracks were hidden by a meter-long layer of water. “But from somewhere, as happens during the May floods, two boatmen appeared who took rare citizens to the Pier and back for free.” A river tug was thrown ashore and a ship repair yard was flooded by a stray wave.

But downstream the water spread no more than during the floods that regularly occurred before the construction of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station.

Local residents, who were repeatedly interviewed by meticulous local historians, confirmed that there was a lot of drowned livestock, and hives with dead bees washed up on the shore. But there were not and could not be many thousands of casualties, since in fact there was a war going on and no white steamers were plying along the river. The refugees had already fled to the left bank; there were no bridges.

Who should drown?

If, after all, “two combined military armies and a cavalry corps,” then indeed, on August 17, the command authorized the withdrawal of troops from the Southern Front to the Dnieper in order to organize a strong defense.

In the evening of the same day, Combat Order No. 0077/OP followed, which determined the procedure for the withdrawal of troops from the line of the Ingulets River. The 2nd Cavalry Corps was supposed to retreat to the Nikopol-Nizhny Rogachik area. The 18th Army received the task of holding the Nikopol-Nizhny Rogachik-Kakhovka sector. The 9th Army stood from Kakhovka to Kherson.

The pontoon park has long been lost. Units crossed the one and a half kilometer river on light ferries, floating piers, barges, ships of the Dnieper River Shipping Company, and laid wooden platforms on fishing boats. The crossing began in the morning of August 18.

According to the combat report of the 18th Army, “the strictest timing, precise organization of loading and unloading, and round-the-clock operation of tugboats made it possible to transport the bulk of the troops to the eastern bank by the morning of August 22.” The 9th successfully completed all activities on the 21st.

Why weren’t they sucked into “giant whirlpools”?

Yes, because from the DneproGES dam to the village of Nizhny Rogachik it is approximately 125 kilometers. And to the village of Velikaya Lepetikha - about 145. To Kachkarovka, where the 18th Army was crossing, it was already 160, and the 9th Army was even further. Any person who did not skip physics at school should understand that “thirty-meter waves” do not travel such distances.

A simple calculation and the usual logic: when a small section of the dam is destroyed, a breakthrough wave about 12 meters high and about a hundred wide from the very first second begins to diverge along the kilometer-long width of the Dnieper near Zaporozhye and further along the floodplain. After 20 seconds, this is already a one and a half meter wave, and further downstream the level rise will be five centimeters per minute, rapidly decreasing to zero.

The calculation is approximate, but innocent cats, dogs and various livestock could have suffered from the water. Not a hundred thousand people.

By September 6, units of the 247th Infantry Division, formed from residents of Zaporozhye, cleared Khortytsia of the enemy, and shelling of the city stopped. The defending units were distributed along the right bank of the Dnieper and left their positions in an organized manner only on October 4.

A history that one can rightfully be proud of, as well as the DneproGES, which is still operating today. And always remember that the laws of physics are not rewritten as famously as history.

A classic example of such an article.

A study of the available documents of the 157th regiment of the NKVD troops for the protection of especially important industrial enterprises, which guarded and defended the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station until the last minute, allows us to establish the time of the dam explosion with an accuracy of hours: 20.00-20.30 on August 18, 1941. It was at this time that the Dnieper hydroelectric station, the Dnieper dams, and the railway bridge across the Dnieper were blown up.
Military transports and people who were moving along the dam at that time naturally died. As a result of the explosion of the bridge and dam on the island of Khortitsa, an infantry regiment, which was being transported at that time to the eastern shore, was cut off.
A large gap appeared in the body of the dam, and active water discharge began. As a result, a vast flood zone arose in the lower reaches of the Dnieper. A giant wave washed away several enemy crossings and sank many fascist units hiding in the floodplains. But the water that broke free did not divide people into “us” and “strangers”.
An almost thirty-meter avalanche of water swept through the Dnieper floodplain, flooding everything in its path. The entire lower part of Zaporozhye with huge reserves of various goods, military materials and tens of thousands of tons of food products and other property was demolished in just an hour. Dozens of ships, along with their crews, perished in that terrible stream. The force of the wave generated by the explosion of the DneproGES dam was such that the Volochaevka monitor was thrown ashore and could then be used as a defensive structure only on land.
In the floodplain zone of the island of Khortitsa and the Dnieper floodplains, tens of kilometers to Nikopol and further, military units were in positions. The explosion of the dam sharply raised the water level in the lower reaches of the Dnieper, where at that time the crossing of the troops of the 2nd Cavalry Corps, the 18th and 9th Armies, which were retreating near Nikolaev, began. These troops were “cut off” during the crossing, partly replenished the number of troops that were surrounded and captured, and partly managed to cross in incredibly difficult conditions, abandoning artillery and military equipment.

It is impossible to perceive the next repetition of this myth as anything other than a continuation of the policy of de-Sovietization on the territory of Ukraine. The constant repetition of a myth should lead to its recognition as an immutable truth from the category of “everyone knows this.”

Why is this a myth?

Because almost all the information presented in this and other similar articles is not true!

Let's analyze the myth in more detail.

1. Let's start with the first passage in which the “cannibalistic essence of the Soviet government, which did not spare human lives,” is immediately visible.

...Military transports and people who were moving along the dam at that time naturally died...

This is how one imagines a human river of tiredly wandering refugees, including old people, women and children. Military men with stern faces coming towards them, the creaking of moving carts and the roar of cars. And suddenly bang - an explosion and it all disappears in a whirlwind of fire and raging water. In reality, according to all the recollections of the participants in the events, by the time the dam was blown up, it was under direct fire from the enemy and, accordingly, there was no movement on it:

In the afternoon, when the laying of explosives was almost completed, a representative of the front headquarters arrived, who handed the representatives of the military command at the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station a telegram from the Commander-in-Chief of the Southwestern Direction, Marshal S. M. Budyonny, specifying the date of the explosion. It stated that in case of danger of the dam being occupied by the Germans, it should be put out of action.
It was getting dark, and the soldiers crossed the turna to the left bank, since it was no longer possible to pass along the dam from above, because it was under heavy enemy artillery fire.
Suddenly the shelling stopped and there was an oppressive silence, which, given the uncertainty of the situation, got on the nerves of our people worse than the shelling...
The moment came when the commander of the military unit defending the Dnieper Hydroelectric Station closed the contacts of the battery, a dull explosion shook the dam... The explosion... destroyed several spans of the drainage part of the dam. The explosion killed not only the Nazis who were on the dam, but also with the rapid rise of water below the power plant, in the Dnieper floodplains of the right bank, a lot of troops and weapons of the enemy, who were preparing to cross to the left bank, were flooded... With pain in the heart and hope for a soon returning to the banks of the Dnieper, the power plant workers left for the East in the dead of night...

As for the undermining of the bridge from Khortitsa, it was completely justified due to the fact that the Germans, on the shoulders of the retreating troops, captured the bridge across the Old Dnieper and almost captured the bridge leading across the New Dnieper to Zaporozhye itself. At the same time, there were also no crowds of civilians or military on the blown-up bridge, otherwise this would certainly have been reflected in the memoirs of the participants in the events, in which there are clearly claims against the bombers, but there are no accusations of anyone’s death. In the same way, the regiment cut off by the explosion of the bridge, judging by these memories, was not washed away by the wave at all and was even partially able to cross to the left bank.

A few minutes later we dismounted from the truck on the bridge connecting the city with the island of Khortitsa, since it was no longer possible to drive the car further. The bridge was clogged with an avalanche of people: cars, carts and cattle. It took superhuman efforts from each of us to hold back those fleeing in panic under enemy fire and turn them towards the enemy...
Here we met with Major General Kharitonov, who approved our actions and personally helped form combat detachments and clarified combat missions for them. The enemy was stopped. Three enemy tanks were knocked out on the bridge. Everyone perked up, cherishing the hope that reinforcements would soon approach us.
But after some time, the situation on the island of Khortitsa became simply critical and, it seemed, hopeless. There was a stunning explosion, and soon another. The lintel of the dam was blown up and the bridge connecting the island with the city of Zaporozhye was undermined. The bridge over the old riverbed remained intact and, in fact, became open to the fascist evil spirits.
...The enemy broke through to the island and occupied its southern part. Continuing to provide fierce resistance to many times superior enemy forces, our forces weakened, some began to flee to the Dnieper.
The authenticity of the critical situation that has developed on the island of Khortitsa and our doom is confirmed... by a telegram from the head of the political department of the Southern Front, Comrade. Mamonov addressed to the head of the Main Political Directorate of the Red Army, Comrade Mekhlis, dated August 20, 1941. It says: -...On the left sector of the army [as a result of repeated attacks by enemy tanks and engine units, the Zaporozhye bridgehead was abandoned. Lieutenant Colonel Petrovsky - the head of the engineering department of the front headquarters and the head [head] of the Epin department (research and testing institute) - a representative of the General Staff, without the knowledge of the Military Council of the front, they blew up a dam and a bridge... The explosion of a lintel and a bridge put about 3,000 people on the island in a difficult situation Khortitsa...” In this telegram you will read that the perpetrators of this explosion were arrested and tried by a military tribunal.

2. And now we begin to analyze the most important component of the myth - the gigantic all-crushing wave that destroyed tens of thousands of lives.

An almost thirty-meter avalanche of water swept through the Dnieper floodplain, flooding everything in its path. The entire lower part of Zaporozhye with huge reserves of various goods, military materials and tens of thousands of tons of food products and other property was demolished in just an hour. Dozens of ships, along with their crews, perished in that terrible stream. The force of the wave generated by the explosion of the DneproGES dam was such that the Volochaevka monitor was thrown ashore and could then be used as a defensive structure only on land.

It sounds menacing. After all, we have seen disaster films more than once where a giant wave sweeps away everything in its path. And we imagine something similar.
Reality differs from fiction in that the laws of physics apply to it. And they impose significant restrictions. Why is the above picture nothing more than a colorful fantasy? Consider the boring numbers.
The pressure of the DneproGES dam (the difference between the water level above and below the dam) is 38 meters. It would seem that this is a 30-meter wave. There are just a couple of nuances.

First point.

A wave of such height can only appear if the dam collapses along its entire length and height at once!!! There was nothing like this in the case of DneprHES.
The explosion destroyed about 100 meters of the 1200 dam. And not to its entire height, as photographs confirm. So a wave of 30 meters in height could not be achieved even theoretically.

Destruction of the Dnieper hydroelectric power station. View from the upper pool.

Destruction of the Dnieper hydroelectric power station. View from the tailwater.

Second point.

The height of the wave during a breakthrough depends on the width of the flow. Simply put, water has the property of fluidity, so it does not flow in a narrow stream, repeating the shape of a breakthrough, but spreads out in all directions. Moreover, the wider the river valley, the lower the height of the breakthrough wave (which is quite natural, since the volume of water passing through the breach is limited and, accordingly, with an equal cross-section, an increase in width leads to a decrease in height). Look at the map and pay attention to the width of the valley and, most importantly, elevation marks and coastal cliffs.

Topographic map of modern Zaporozhye.

So vivid fantasies about an all-crushing 30-meter wave are crushed by boring reality.
Approximate calculations show that the wave height after the dam was blown up was no more than 5 meters, and in the area of ​​the shipyard and pier it was 3-4 meters. In the Dnieper floodplains, thanks to the wide river floodplain, the water rise was no more than 1-1.5 meters. Most likely, the numbers were even lower, since a massive release of water began a day before the dam was blown up, and the reservoir level was lower than usual.
You can estimate the flow of water during a breakthrough using photographs of the dam in the spring of 1942, when during the flood the water level in front of the dam rose almost to the operating level. Compare for yourself:

DneproGES. Current state.

DneproGES in the spring of 1942.

DneproGES in the spring of 1942.

DneproGES in the spring of 1942.

Accordingly, there could be no trace of any dozens of dead ships, especially with their crews, which is confirmed by the absence of wreckage and sunken hulls. Constantly reading lies about sunken ships, I have never seen the names of these ships given. Which is no wonder, in this case it is always easy to check the fate of a particular ship and find out that it did not end with the explosion of the DneproGES.

The only ship that everyone mentions, the Volochaevka monitor, is clear evidence of a lie. The ship was indeed thrown into shallow water when the water rose (as can be seen on German aerial photographs of September 14). But it cannot be considered “washed up on the shore”.

Monitor "Volochaevka". German aerial photograph September 14, 1941.

3. Now let's begin to consider the issue for which this topic is actually being raised - about victims.

First, let's look at where the wave from the break of the Dnieper hydroelectric dam could destroy people. And it turns out that there are not many such places!!!

To begin with, it should be noted that the Dnieper is a river with very variable flow throughout the year - during the spring flood, 70-80% of the annual flow passes through it, which leads to large spring floods that often turn into floods. This was, among others, the reason for the creation of the Dnieper cascade of hydroelectric power stations, which began to regulate the flow of the Dnieper and ensure its more uniform distribution throughout the year and protection from floods.

Therefore, no one settled directly in the Dnieper floodplain, and all settlements were located on the heights surrounding the floodplain. When walking around Zaporozhye or riding a train along the Dnieper towards Crimea, you can see that all the houses are located on hills. The constantly flooded floodplain was practically not used, at most for haymaking, pasture and fishing.
The only exception was the Oak Grove area with a pier, ship repair yard and warehouses located there. But even there, the volume of destruction was comparable to a strong flood, which indirectly confirms the wave height figures given above.

Here are the recollections of an eyewitness:

In the heat of the moment and out of fear, in early August, I fled to the Kazachiy farm and stayed there until August 17th, and on the 18th I returned to Zaporozhye on foot. Trains did not run, bridges were blown up, Nazi planes bombed everything.
When I arrived in the city on August 18, I immediately went to the pier, picked up my work book there and received 18 rubles for payroll. At nine in the evening on the 19th, our people blew up the dam (lintel) of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station, and the water poured out in a strong wave and demolished everything in its path. And in the floodplains below the city there remained a lot of livestock and people. In the morning, I wanted to get to the pier along Glissernaya and once again talk with those who were still wrapping things up, but I saw that the entire Oak Grove and coastal houses were flooded with Dnieper water, as in the spring flood, and it was impossible to get to the pier without a boat. Thank you, some old man took people to the pier on his boat for free.
There was an ominous silence and desolation in the city; the Germans were expected from hour to hour - the people, on occasion, robbed mills and shops. The authorities came to their senses, and after a couple of days order was restored in the city.

Those. There is no talk of any catastrophic destruction in the only part of Zaporozhye accessible to the wave after the breakthrough; even the pier remained intact!!!

Now let's talk about the floodplains. This is what the mythmakers tell us:

They said that approximately 20,000 Red Army soldiers died in the floodplains at that time - no one thought to count exactly how many. In addition to the troops, tens of thousands of livestock and many people who were at work there at that time died in the floodplains.

Since it is not clear what exactly the floodplains are, it is not clear what specific parts we are talking about. These are like “spherical 20 thousand Red Army soldiers in a vacuum.”

Not a single memoir contains information about comrades who died in the flood, not a single report reflects such losses, and soldiers who “miraculously survived” did not appear even during the years of perestroika and independence. One-time losses of this size are simply impossible to hide. But not a trace!!!

Likewise, there are no similar facts in the memories of residents of coastal villages. There are no stories of miraculous survivors, no memories of dead relatives, no descriptions of thousands of decomposing corpses washed ashore. Many people remember about the corpses of cows, goats and dogs, but no one remembers about human bodies. There are no mass graves of “victims of the Dnieper hydroelectric power station” on the banks of the Dnieper.

And finally, the icing on the cake - “Goebbels propaganda”, which used even the slightest crime of the Soviet regime (and even invented many), never used the explosion of the Dnieper Hydroelectric Power Station in its activities.
It would seem - this is it!!! Shoot kilometers of photo and film, invite the Red Cross and international organizations!!! Tens of thousands of bodies, including women's and children's, crying relatives, mass funerals. What a monstrous crime of the Soviet regime!!! Where is it all? But there is nothing!!!
Maybe it's because nothing happened?

Well. The promotion of this myth shows that the current heirs of Goebbels have gone further than their teacher.

Plus more on historical topics:

1. Declassified documents of the Battle of Stalingrad. New website of the Russian Ministry of Defense with published Soviet and German documents from the time of the Battle of Stalingrad - http://stalingrad75.mil.ru/
2. On the anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising in Poland they wanted a new victory over the Russians - https://www.ridus.ru/news/259651
3. The first Russian victims of the First World War - http://d-clarence.livejournal.com/180348.html
4. Emergency with the submarine M-351 - http://picturehistory.livejournal.com/2529543.html
5. Sevastopol 1949 in color -