Gorlov Viktor

(autotranslated, could have mistakes)

Extreme man

The lighthouse is the one with whom Russia begins

• What is this, a fire?! — Sokolov-Mitrich and I squeeze into the seats of the car. The forest road along which we have been driving for an hour from Sovetskaya Gavan to the Red Partisan lighthouse is suddenly covered with thick white smoke.

“No, this is the sea,” Director of the Vanino branch of Rosmorport Leonid Terebizh, who volunteered to accompany us, smiles condescendingly. How do these non-Far Eastern people know that the sea is not just water, waves and rocks? The sea is primarily fog. At least here, on the shores of the Tartary Strait, where cold currents from the north and warm air from the south meet.

“Just don’t take extra steps in that direction,” Terebizh tells us when we finally slow down in a clearing with an obelisk in memory of the Bolshevik lighthouses executed here in 1919. More precisely, it seems to us that it is in a clearing. For a few seconds, the fog clears, and we see with horror that we are standing two steps away from a cliff no less than a hundred meters high.

The lighthouse itself greets us with a wild howl - this is the voice of a device called a nautofon. It is turned on instead of a spotlight when the sea is occupied by fog. The nautofon warns passing ships: be careful, shore! If you plug your ears with your fingers as hard as you can, you can make a discovery in the field of biology: the body, it turns out, is able to hear with its entire surface. I really want to jump off a cliff or bury my head in the ground just to get rid of these decibels. But Viktor Gorlov doesn’t mind, he stands and smiles, he can even sleep to this howl, he’s already used to it.

Victor is a lighthouse operator with 30 years of experience, 17 of which have been the director of the Red Partisan.

“There is minimal rotation in our profession,” admits Gorlov. — Being a lighthouse is like being a tramp. Almost incurable.

• Why?

• Because freedom. The bosses are far away, the sea is close. And the sea is always the sea, even under the tsar, even under the communists, even under the capitalists.

The “Red Partisan” lighthouse, standing in front of the entrance to Sovetskaya Gavan, is iconic for these places. First of all, he is the most beautiful. This is not just a free-standing tower with a barn-type house attached to it. This monolithic structure - the lighthouse grows directly from the lighthouse maker's house, like a bell tower from a temple.

Secondly, this is perhaps the neatest lighthouse I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen plenty of them. Victor treats “Partizan” like a Soviet car enthusiast treats his only “penny”: all his free time he paints, cleans, polishes something until it shines.

Finally, this is a lighthouse with an interesting history; you can bring people here on excursions. And they bring you. It was built in 1897 from granite and was called Nikolaevsky; Vladimir Arsenyev, the famous explorer of the Far East, author of Dersu Uzala, stayed overnight here. But the bell, which the watchman rang when the nautofon had not yet been invented, can be struck. And here is a cannon from which they fired blank charges during the fog. And here is the copper plate of the manufacturer of all lighthouse equipment: the French company Barbier, 1894. And in general, it is correct to say not “lighthouses”, but “lighthouses”. At least all the lighthouses say so.

— Victor, why are lighthouses needed at all, when all decent ships have long been equipped with a satellite navigation system? Maybe lighthouse maker is a dying profession?

• Well, firstly, in addition to decent ships, there are also indecent ones - of local importance, which do not have GPS. And secondly, you are right: more and more lighthouses around the world are equipped with solar panels and switched to automatic mode. But Russia has its own specifics - solar panels are instantly stolen here. This means that beacons will still be needed. At least as security guards.

“In Russia, many lighthouses are simply closed,” continues Terebizh. - But not this one. Here - from Cape Datta to Cape Krasny Partizan - there is indeed a very dangerous area, and even a GPS with an echo sounder does not always help: underwater rocks, powerful winds, plus currents that change unpredictably, and in winter there is also difficult ice conditions

For the next half hour, Terebizh and Gorlov enthusiastically discuss the latest adventures of passing ships. It's like a conversation between two fishermen or fans about how a fish fell or a goal was almost scored.

• Yuzefych, do you remember how the submarine confused the bay and ran aground? Thank God they managed to save the crew. Do you remember the bulk carrier "General Vladimir Zaimov"?

• Yes, Ukrainian. We tell them in Vanino: “This is not the Sea of ​​Azov, wait a couple of days, wait out the current!” They didn't listen. And when they were carried straight onto the rocks, they started shouting SOS. It’s good that the coastal ice was already strong at that time, but still soft - they touched it with their starboard side and set off at full speed, breaking away.

— Victor, why do you have the inventory number painted right on the building? Are you afraid that the lighthouse will be stolen?

• Yes, these are strong business executives from the Ministry of Defense who came. “Why,” they say, “is there no inventory number?” Well, I drew it. They left happy. I say: freedom!

Source: Expert. Sergey Kaptilkin (2011) http://expert.ru/russian_reporter/2011/31/chelovek-krajnij/

PHOTO: SERGEY KAPTILKIN FOR “RR”

06.08 (13.08). Lighthouse "Red Partisan", Khabarovsk Territory. Lighthouse maker Viktor Gorlov makes a traditional detour.