#ARCTIC. #SIBERIA. THIS IS TAIMYR. In March, a large group of young people joined the Norilsk-Talnah high-voltage line construction. It was called the life artery: without electricity, the first mine construction was impossible. The youth did not fail – by August the line was built.
At the end of 1962, the first Talnah mine shafts sinking began. It was built in parallel with the geological exploration, without waiting for the new deposit reserves official approval.
The first builders came to the industrial site of the future mine in May 1962, and at the end of the year the Geology and Subsoil Protection Ministry expert commission arrived in Talnah. The government, having considered its materials, also decided to start laying the mine before the reserves approval.
On December 3, the Kaluga department of the Shahtspetsstroy trust began sinking shafts. The name Mayak was given to the mine at the Norilsk city conference.
At that time, there was neither a bridge across the Norilka river nor a railway to Talnah. Cut off from Norilsk, construction was difficult and often called heroic and unique.
It is noteworthy that in the same year, a very active and young – 38 years old – Vladimir Dolgih came to the combine’s management, and 39-year-old Victor Deyev became the new head of Norilsk.
Norilsk, meanwhile, also continued to be built: two new streets appeared, named after the former people’s commissar of heavy industry Ordzhonikidze, and the Emergency Commission former founder Dzerzhinsky.
The names were explained by the personal participation of Ordzhonikidze and Dzerzhinsky in the Far North development, the combine and the city construction.
In the History Spot photo project previous publication we told that 65 years ago the USSR Council of Ministers named the Norilsk Mining and Metallurgical Combine after Avraamy Zavenyagin.
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Text: Svetlana Ferapontova, Photo: Nornickel Polar Branch archive
