The Cheliuskin
This essay was published in 2000 as part of the original Meeting of Frontiers website.
By the early twentieth century Arctic exploration was no longer considered exotic. The Soviet Union was unique among the circumpolar nations in developing ambitious plans to conquer and exploit the extreme northern regions. Most countries viewed the polar zones as hostile and barren and regarded exploration largely as a means to expand the geographic knowledge already acquired by earlier explorers. The Soviets, however, regarded the Far North as a challenge--one that could boost economic production and even prove the overall merit of socialism. Many early Soviet legends sprang from reports of heroic Arctic exploits. In the 1930s one of the most significant of these ventures concerned the steamship Cheliuskin.
The Cheliuskin was completed in Denmark in early 1933 and set out in July of that year on a voyage aimed at navigating, in one season, the Northern Sea Route from Murmansk to the Bering Strait via the Arctic Ocean, and thence through the Pacific Ocean to Vladivostok. The Cheliuskin was named after Semen Cheliuskin, a tsarist explorer who played an important role in the Great Northern Expedition (1733-43) by charting the coastline of the Taimyr Peninsula along the Arctic shore. In the Stalinist period, the ship that bore his name embodied a national ambition--to help to prove the viability of new shipping lanes and open up the possibility of regular commercial transit in the Arctic. The Soviet quest both mirrored the age-old search for a Northwest Passage to connect the Atlantic and Pacific oceans and held some key myths specific to Stalinism, particularly the ability to conquer nature itself.
The commander of the expedition was Otto Iu. Schmidt, a noted Soviet scientist and explorer. Traveling east in late 1933 the Cheliuskin reached the Bering Strait before becoming caught in pack ice. Much as the U.S.S. Jeanette had done more than fifty years earlier, Schmidt's vessel subsequently drifted in the Chukchi Sea before it was crushed by the ice and sank in February 1934. All but one crew member survived. Stranded on the ice, they lived in tents until Soviet planes arrived and flew the survivors--over the course of one month, ending in mid-April--to Cape Vankarem on the mainland. Media coverage within the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was intense. Upon his return to Moscow, Schmidt was feted by Stalin and the Politburo in the Kremlin. The Soviet government never admitted that the expedition had failed and state propagandists turned the story into one of heroic rescue. The pilots, including A. V. Liapidevskii and S. S. Levanevskii, became famous and were the first to become a "Hero of the Soviet Union"--the national award and title that became one of the most coveted tributes of the Stalin era.
Timeline
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July 12, 1933
The Cheliuskin departs from Leningrad before a large crowd on Vasilevskii Island.
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July 20, 1933
The ship arrives in Copenhagen, Denmark, and remains there until July 25.
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August 2, 1933
The Cheliuskin reaches Murmansk, where it is resupplied and meets the icebreaker Krasin, which accompanies it for a time.
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August 24, 1933
The ship passes by Unity Island - inaccurately registered on maps.
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September 16, 1933
The Cheliuskin passes North Cape - later renamed Cape Otto Schmidt, after the noted Soviet scientist and explorer.
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September 23, 1933
The ship moves into a zone of pack ice near Koliuchin Island, eventually becoming stuck.
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October 5, 1933
The crew works to free the Cheliuskin from the surrounding ice, succeeding after almost a week.
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Late October, 1933
The ship again becomes stuck and drifts in the general direction of the pack ice; a favorable wind pushes it toward the Bering Strait.
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November, 1933
By the end of November it becomes obvious that the Cheliuskin will not break free from the pack ice and will have to winter on the Chukchi Sea.
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November 25, 1933
The ship is squeezed by large ice floes and is in danger of sinking. The next day, the crew unloads equipment from the ship and sets up a campsite 120 meters behind the ship.
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December 1, 1933
Cracks in the ice form under the tents, forcing the crew to reload equipment on the ship. The Cheliuskin drifts for the next two months in the Chukchi Sea to the east of Wrangell Island.
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February 13, 1934
Increasing wind speed results in the ship's creaking and eventual breach by ice. The Cheliuskin takes on water and the crew unloads all critical supplies. By afternoon, the ship begins to sink. Captain Vladimir Voronin and Otto Schmidt jump off just in time; only one crew member goes down with the ship. The crew next sets up tents on a part of the ice that becomes known as Camp Schmidt.
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February 14, 1934
The crew makes radio contact with the village of Uelen on the Chukotka Peninsula in an attempt to arrange rescue.
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March 5, 1934
Pilot Anatolii Liapidevskii sights Camp Schmidt, lands on the ice, and rescues the women and children before returning to Uelen.
From the album Geroicheskaia epopeia. National Library of Russia. Otdel Estampov. The Soviet pilots who rescued the crew of the Cheliuskin became instant national celebrities in the USSR as [a] "Hero of the Soviet Union." -
April 13, 1934
Last of the Cheliuskin crew flown from Camp Schmidt to Cape Vankarem on the Chukotka Peninsula. The rescue takes one month due to weather delays and the need to fly in Soviet planes from stops in Khabarovsk; Nome, Alaska; and Cape Oliutorskii.
Heroical "Cheliuskin". National Library of Russia. Otdel Estampov. Commemorative matchbox cover glorifies historic rescue of the crew of the Cheliuskin