Ernest Malinowski

Ernest Malinowski

Ernest Malinowski (born January 5, 1818 in Seweryny near Nowohrad-Wolynskyj , Russian Empire , today Ukraine , † March 2, 1899 in Lima ) was a Polish civil engineer .

Life

Malinowski attended the prestigious Lyceum in Kremenets from 1827 to 1831 . He and his family seem to have been involved in the November uprising in Poland in 1830/31, at the end of which his father emigrated with him and his brother to Paris via Dresden .

There Malinowski attended the Lycée Louis-le-Grand and then studied from 1834 at the École polytechnique and from 1836 at the École nationale des ponts et chaussées . After graduating in 1838, he worked on the Paris– Pontoise railway line , was posted to Bône and Algiers and worked on the Meuse regulation. He left France during the Cracow uprising . After a period in Leipzig and Baden , he returned to France in 1849. There he was involved in hydraulic engineering in the Loir-et-Cher department .

In 1852 he was sent to Peru , initially for six years, to set up a state engineering administration and school in Lima . After a short time he left the project and worked on some smaller construction projects. From 1858 he worked in the Peruvian service with the planning and construction of various railway lines. In the Spanish-South American Guano War , he made great contributions to the fortification of the port city of Callao , which was able to successfully defend itself against the Spanish fleet on May 2, 1866.

Between 1868 and 1869, Malinowski prepared the feasibility study for Henry Meiggs for the Callao – Lima – La Oroya railway . In December 1869, Meiggs agreed with the Peruvian government to build the Ferrocarril Central Trasandino , later the Ferrocarril Central Andino . Malinowski prepared the planning and, as chief engineer, led the construction of this route, which rises to a height of 4781 m with a large number of switchbacks , tunnels and bridges, including the Verrugas Bridge . It was the highest railway line in the world until the Lhasa Railway was built in 2005 .

Ernest Malinowski died in Lima on March 2, 1899. His grave is in the Lithuanian Presbitero Maestro Cemetery in the La Victoria district.

In 1999, the railway bridge in Toruń was renamed Ernest Malinowski Railway Bridge in his honor .

literature

• Polish Explorers , Publisher: Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, ISBN 83-89175-51-7 , page 13.
• Danuta Bartkowiak: Ernest Malinowski constructor kolei transandyjskiej . Zakład Badań Narodowościowych PAN, 1996, ISBN 978-83-8537609-5 .

Web links

Commons : Ernest Malinowski  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files