Druzhba route

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Special postage stamp of the GDR, 1978

The Druzhba route , named after the Russian word Дружба for “friendship”, was the 550-kilometer construction section of the 2,750-kilometer-long natural gas pipeline “ Soyuz ”. The "route" was built by the German Democratic Republic (GDR) as the central youth object of the Free German Youth (FDJ). The length of the GDR section was 518 kilometers. This natural gas route was built in several stages over decades.

Today the pipeline on the German section is operated by the Schwedt mineral oil network.

history

At the 28th meeting of the Council for Mutual Economic Aid (COMECON) in Sofia in June 1974, the Soviet Union and the Eastern Bloc states agreed to supply gas and oil in exchange for construction work on the natural gas pipeline. The aim was to develop the natural gas deposit near Orenburg and to build a natural gas pipeline to Uzhgorod on the Soviet western border.

During construction from 1974 to 1978, the COMECON countries involved were each given a 550-kilometer section in the order Bulgaria , Czechoslovakia , Poland , GDR and Hungary . The GDR construction phase ran through the Ukraine from Kremenchug on the Dnepr to Bar in western Ukraine. It was the largest investment in the GDR. The sites of the construction sites were Kremenchug, Alexandrowka , Talnoje , Gaisin , Bar and Cherkassy (on the Dnepr), where the construction site directorate was based.

All costs for the planning, the necessary technology for up to 10,000 employees at the same time, the necessary infrastructure , an airlift and even apartments of the Soviet operators had to be borne by the GDR. The route was refinanced through the free delivery of part of the natural gas to the GDR and later through the Unification Treaty to the Federal Republic of Germany . Pipes from Japan, Italy and the FRG with a diameter of 1420 millimeters and mostly 16-19 millimeters wall thickness were laid on the 2760 kilometer route. 105 kilometers of welding seams on 26,000 circular seams were hand-made. While 1,113,000 were electrodes of the type Fox-cel and 5,300,000 electrodes of the type KbXs consumed. On the welding bases, an additional 55 tons of submerged arc welding wire and 105 tons of welding powder were used to weld seams when assembling individual tubes into segments. 31 streets were cut, eight underground crossings of traffic lines and 21 overhead lines on pillars were created. In addition, nine swamps, a reservoir and the Dnepr river were crossed, with some new methods of crossing swamps, conquering steep slopes and using automatic welding machines were developed and used.

In later years the natural gas pipeline was further expanded and the customer countries were once again called in for construction work. The three construction sections of the natural gas route allocated to the GDR for the period 1982 to 1993 were built this time by a large number of GDR companies with over 10,000 workers and a few students. The workers there were allowed to pay half of their daily allowances, paid in rubles, into a Genex account ("East"), which were converted into GDR marks, and then corresponding goods from the Genex catalog "that are difficult to acquire in GDR retailers" East ”order. A Genex “West” account, on the other hand, was kept in D-Marks. Only "Western relatives" could pay into this. The product ranges in the Genex "West" and "East" catalogs differed greatly from one another. Further perks were the so-called “route surcharge” of 25 marks from the GDR, which was calculated per working day and transferred together with the wages / salaries, and the so-called “car card”. The latter was a special purchase ticket for a car of your choice, which was handed over after three years of uninterrupted train-path activity and with which a car could be obtained after a further waiting period of about two years (the "normal" waiting time for car orders in the GDR was around twelve Years for a Trabant or 15 to 18 years for a Wartburg ).

In the years 2005/2006 , 2007/2008 and 2008/2009 the Russian-Ukrainian gas dispute arose, during which the gas pipeline was shut down several times in winter ( there was also a dispute with Belarus in the case of the friendship oil pipeline The delivery to Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Germany was also discontinued; the last time delivery was cut by a quarter from September 2013 due to the potash dispute ). It was about differences of opinion on the question of remuneration for scheduled and unscheduled deliveries and the question of the conclusion of new delivery contracts. As a result, the delivery was stopped on January 1st, 2006. In March 2008 deliveries were reduced by up to 50% (according to different sources up to 60%). For similar reasons, deliveries were completely stopped from January 1, 2009, which affected the entire length of the line. Since then there has been increasing discussion about the reliability of Russian deliveries to Europe. In order to gain independence from the transit countries Ukraine and Belarus, the Nord Stream was built between 2005 and 2011 .

Honoring the builders of the Druzhba route

Honorary gift from the Central Council of Free German Youth

The Central Council of the Free German Youth honored the "builders" of the Druzhba route with a gift of honor. This consisted of a downsized blue natural gas pipeline with red end caps. On one side the route of the station of the 2750 km long natural gas pipeline was shown. On the opposite side of the tube, the symbol of the FDJ was printed with the following text: “Dedicated to the builders of the Druzhba route - Central Council of the Free German Youth”. The content of the tube was a location and station plan of the Soyuz natural gas route as well as several different FDJ Druzhba route honor scarfs and badges.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Gerd Eggers, Horst Matthies, Margarete Neumann, Ulrich Völkel: Adventure route. Experiences and observations. New Life Publishing House, Berlin 1978.

literature

  • Gerd Eggers, Horst Matthies, Margarete Neumann, Ulrich Völkel: Adventure route. Experiences and observations. New Life Publishing House, Berlin 1978.
  • Hajo Obuchoff, Lutz Wabnitz, Frank Michael Wagner: The route. A building of the century in pictures and stories. Das Neue Berlin, Berlin 2012, ISBN 978-3360021397 .

Web links

Commons : Druzhba route  - collection of images, videos and audio files