Big Volga Lighthouse

(autotranslated, could have mistakes)

From the book The Moscow-Volga Canal 1932-1937 by the NKVD USSR Bureau of Technical Reports on the Construction of the Moscow-Volga Canal. State Publishing House of Construction Literature. Moscow-Leningrad, 1940

CHAPTER X

CONDITIONS OF THE WATERWAY AND OPERATIONAL LINKS

To ensure proper and normal operation of the Moscow-Volga Canal, it is equipped with a special navigational condition of the waterway and operational links.

The navigational condition of the waterway creates the possibility for ships to safely navigate the canal and its reservoirs both day and night. The operational link ensures the possibility of managing the operation of the canal structures, piers, pumping stations, and hydroelectric power stations, as well as regulating the movement of ships.

The navigational condition of the waterway implemented on the Moscow-Volga Canal represents a new and first-ever applied system of such devices, and the operational link is the most complete, well-established, and fast-acting system on the internal waterways of the USSR.

NAVIGATIONAL CONDITION OF THE WATERWAY

The general scheme of the waterway condition of the Moscow-Volga Canal represents a system of navigational luminous electrified signals and signs placed along the ship route of the canal and reservoirs. The implementation of this system of waterway condition on the Moscow-Volga Canal for the first time in the USSR resolved the problem of replacing the previously used gas and kerosene equipment for condition signs on waterways.

In designing the navigational condition for the Moscow-Volga Canal, the entire experience of the waterway condition work in the USSR (and in particular on the relatively recently completed construction — the Stalin White Sea-Baltic Canal) and the latest achievements in this field both in the USSR and abroad (in particular on American waterways) were taken into account.

The navigational condition of the waterway of the Moscow-Volga Canal consists of the following signs and signals:

1. Two-lantern beacons........................................................... 2

2. Identification signs........................................................... 10

3. Way lights........................................................................ 462

4. Stave slit signs...................................................... 27

5. Perspective bank lights...................................................... 58

6. Target masts (for perspective staves)................................. 11

7. Electrobuoys on reservoirs................................................. 100

8. Bank lights...................................................... 8

9. Semaphore (on locks, barrier gates, ferries across the canal and others)......................................... 118

10. Bridge and dam lights.............................................. 38

11. Stop lights in lock chambers...................................... 92

12. Simple stave signs...................................................... 6

A two-lantern beacon is a brick structure, rendered with plaster on a reinforced concrete base, in the form of a tower with hatches on the upper platform. The light sign of the beacon is an electric lamp with a polished lens, installed on the roof of the hatch. Inside the hatch, there is a rotating aviation projector, which should work both day and night during fog and mist. The beacon is supplied with electricity from a low-voltage aerial network.

Such beacons are installed on the approach from the "Moscow Sea" to the Ivan'kovsky advance port, in the head of the canal. The stave of two beacons (large and small) passes from the middle of the Volga at the turning point near the village of Omutnya and through the center of the northern spur of the breakwater of the advance port. On the northern beacon, on the roof of the hatch, there is a green light filter, and on the larger southern beacon at the dam — red. On the front facade of the large beacon (fig. 123), there is a 10-meter neon line, and such a line at a height of 2.6 m is placed on the small northern beacon (fig. 124). The height of the large beacon is 25 m, the small one — 6.5 m.

Image removed from public review package. Local review only · not public record-level source only · image1_1.jpeg

Big Volga Lighthouse

Image removed from public review package. Local review only · not public record-level source only · image2_1.jpeg

Small Volga Lighthouse

Identification signs are intended for marking the entrance to the canal when approaching from the reservoir. They represent a brick, plastered structure of white color (fig. 125). At the top of the signs, an automatic circular electric flashing light is installed; on the right side of the canal — red light, on the left — green.

The design of the identification signs is accepted in three different types with the same equipment.

Each identification sign, from the side facing the canal, has a 1.5—2.0-meter neon line, which is activated in cases of poor visibility (fog, mist).

Way lights are intended for marking the ship route of the canal. They are installed on both sides of the canal symmetrically, one against the other, at a distance of 250 m from each other.

Way lights are made in the form of a metal casing of height 1.0 m, installed on a white painted wooden plastered foundation (fig. 126). Inside the metal casing, there are two electric lamps, one of which (upper) through diffusing colored glass gives light towards the pool, and the other (lower) illuminates the bank and the water level in the canal. The visibility range of the lights is about 2 km.

Slit staves are installed on sections of reservoirs having underwater cuts, where the navigation of ships must be strictly maintained within the ship route.

Signs of slit staves represent wooden structures in the form of towers up to a height of 13.0 m, painted white (fig. 127).

Slit staves are divided into one-sided and two-sided, and the point of entry of the ship onto the stave is marked by way lights, buoys, or identification signs.

During daylight, the slit stave signs are used by their white color, and at night — by the lit lights. On the front two signs, red lights are burning, and on the back — a yellow intensified light and a 10-meter white line (helium). In poor weather (fog, mist), in addition to the mentioned signals, red 10-meter neon lines are lit on the front signs and a yellow intensified light on the back ones. The limit of deviation from the stave axis is determined by the coincidence of the back light with one of the front signs.

Perspective staves (bank lights) are installed on long straight sections of the canal and consist of a group of paired signs placed opposite each other on the bank of the stone embankment of the canal (fig. 128). The signs are mounted on metal staves of height 0.40—0.90 m, painted black.

The lights of the bank signs have the form of a round metal casing with a diameter of 25 cm.

Target sign is a metal mast of height 12 m. On the top of the mast, there is a sodium lamp, and on the face of the mast facing the canal — a 10-meter red (neon) lamp. At night, in poor visibility, the red lamp constantly burns.

Semaphores are installed at locks, barrier gates, ferry crossings, and are intended for regulating the movement of ships. Semaphores are made in the form of three-digit, railway-type, with green — allowing, red — prohibiting, and yellow — warning lights, burning both day and night.

In addition, behind the mooring buoy, also on the right side of the route, at a distance of 400 m from the head of the lock, on metal masts of height 4—5 m, three-digit long-range semaphores with a beam towards the pool are installed (fig. 129).

At ferry crossings, on both sides of the canal, at a distance of about 100 m from the axis of the ferry crossing, behind the mooring buoy, two-digit two-sided semaphores with beams towards the pool and the ferry crossing are placed.

The control of the lock semaphores is centralized in the lock control panel. The lights of the semaphore are linked with the mechanisms in such a way that when the lock gates are closed, the raised barrier gates and the moving ferry, the allowing light goes out automatically and the prohibiting light turns on.

Bridge and dam lights are installed on both sides of the bridge or on the abutments of the dam.

Bridge lights simultaneously serve as orientation and guiding lights. Bridge lights are electric, with green lenses and metal shields. Dam lights have a violet light.

Stop lights (stop signs) are intended for indicating the boundary of the wharf line. Stop lights are installed on both sides of the lock (embedded in the lock parapet). The light source is a vertical neon tube.

Floating buoys and bank lights are intended for the condition of the ship route in reservoirs. Buoys are made in the form of floating metal cylinders with a body height of 135 cm (fig. 130). On the top of the body, a metal tripod of height 130 cm with a platform is mounted, on which an electric lamp with a photoautomatic and equipment is placed, ensuring a flashing (flickering) character of the light and automatic switching on of the light with the onset of darkness and fog.

Bank lights have the same purpose and construction as buoy lights, but are installed on wooden boxes with elements.

The Government Commission, which reviewed the canal construction, noted in particular that: "The system of sign placement, electrical equipment, and construction of the condition signals of the Moscow-Volga Canal are technically new and first applied on the internal waterways of the USSR."

"The installed equipment is characterized by simplicity of maintenance" (Materials of the Water Transport Section, p. 340).

View Lighthouses of the World on a larger map