The Russian Hydrographic Service (, Gidrograficheskaya sluzhba Rossii), officially the Department of Navigation and Oceanography of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, is the hydrographic office of Russia responsible to for operating lighthouses, facilitating navigation, performing hydrographic surveys and publishing nautical charts.Department of Navigation and Oceanography of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation – Russian Navy It is formally a department of the Ministry of Defence and a unit of the Russian Navy. Its headquarters are located in Saint Petersburg.
The Hydrographic Service was established in 1777 during the expansion of the Imperial Russian Navy but can trace its origins to the time of Tsar Peter the Great in the late 17th century. It has been historically attached to the Russian Navy, and the agents and supervisors of hydrographic works have been largely naval officers throughout its history. Its surveying has been indispensable due to vast size of Russia and its nature that it includes many different seas, long and indented coastlines and a great number of islands, as well as a complex system of waterways and lakes.
The Russia Hydrographic Service is a member of the International Hydrographic Organization.
Competences and functions
Despite having undergone a number of name changes along its history, the main functions of the Hydrographic Service of the Russian Navy have been quite consistently the following: Providing specific services to the Navy, including other branches of the Russian Armed Forces, related to the Russian maritime and coastal areas, as well as navigable inland waters. These services are of a strategic order and encompass the following fields: Navigation and hydrography. Hydrometeorology Surveys Navigation and hydrographic support of maritime activities within Russian waters and implementation of the international Safety of Life at Sea Convention regulations in the waters under Russian jurisdiction. Navy Hydrographic Service – Structure – Russian Ministry of Defence
History
Background
At the time of Peter I hydrographic surveys were carried out following personal decrees of the emperor through the General admiral. Hydrographic tasks were always performed by Naval officers, who from 1724 onward began to work under instructions from the Admiralty Board.
By 1746 important matters concerning hydrography were entrusted to Fleet Captain Alexey Nagayev who compiled the first atlas of the Bering Sea, as well as of the Baltic Sea in 1752. Nagayev's charts were very detailed for its time and, despite a few shortcomings, his atlas of the Baltic Sea was republished in 1757, 1788, 1789 and 1795, serving Russian mariners for more than 50 years.
Foundation and first phase (1777–1885)
In 1777 the Admiralty Board founded the Russian Hydrographic Service, implementing a plan that marked the beginning of systematic drawing of nautical charts.С этой чертежной началось централизованное производство морских карт в России, а дата утверждения штата чертежной — 2 (13) ноября 1777 г. — является датой основания ныне существующего Центрального картографического производства Военно-Морского Флота. In 1799 a committee for the dissemination of marine sciences and the improvement of the drawing of charts was created, and in 1807 the Russian Lighthouse Administration was established so that the lighthouse system in Russian shores, shoals and islands would follow an organized pattern and be provided with regular, state-controlled maintenance. The first director of this section was Leontiy Spafaryev.Igor Alexeev, Lighthouses of the Baltic Sea
In 1827 the special Office of the Hydrographer General was established. In the same year the Corps of Naval Navigators was founded, the chief of which was also a hydrographer. The first and only general of the newly instituted body was hydrographer Admiral Gavril Andreevich Sarychev (in office 1827–31), after whose death the management of the office was transferred to the Chief of Naval Staff Prince A. S. Menshikov. The first and only director of the hydrographic depot was F. F. Schubert (in office 1827–37).Russian Hydrography before 1917
In 1837 the former institutions dealing with hydrography were abolished and all the management of the hydrographic section was transferred to the newly instituted Russian Hydrographic Department, the directors of which were:
A. G. Villamov (1837–54) Baron F. v. Wrangel (1854–55) M. v. Reinecke (1855–59) S. I. Zelenoy (1859–74) G. A. Vevel von Krieger (1874–81) T. F. Veselago (1881) P. N. Nazimov (1892–1898).
Publications The Hydrographic Office engaged in the periodical publication of notes, devoted both to hydrographic information, as well as information on other sectors of naval affairs. The committee, established in 1799, published: In 1801 – "Notice to Mariners" (1 vol.) From 1807 to 1827 – "Notes of the State Admiralty Department" (13 pieces) From 1835 to 1837 – "Notes of the Hydrographic Depot" (5 parts) From 1842 to 1852 – "Notes of the Hydrographic Department." 1854–83 – Annual reports of the Director of the Hydrographic Department.
The Main Hydrographic Office (1885–1917)
In 1885 the Russian Hydrographic Department was overhauled and renamed as 'Main Hydrographic Office' —Главное гидрографическое управление (ГГУ)— of the Admiralty. Its chief was the former director in charge of the lighthouses and navigation of the Baltic Sea, Vice Admiral R. Bazhenov, who was also the chairman of the Maritime Scientific Committee —Морского учёного комитета.
1886 saw the establishment of the meteorological department. In 1891 the fields of drawing, engraving, lithography and printing were integrated into the maritime cartography section and from 1897 this section began successful experiments printing nautical charts using aluminum printing plates. In 1902 a new building with a photographic department, including a workshop introducing innovative photographic reproduction techniques, was built within the premises of the Main Hydrographic Office. By 1904 the new techniques had been mastered by the staff and high-quality material began to be printed.150 лет гидрографической службе военно-морского флота. Исторический очерк. 1977 г.
The duties of the Hydrographic Department at the time included: Planning and carrying out surveys. Preparation of maps, atlases, sailing directions and other guidance materials for safe navigation, as well as making periodical corrections —when needed. Erection and proper maintenance of lighthouses, electric beacons, rescue stations, towers, day beacons, buoys, signals, and other warning devices to improve navigation safety. Supply of military tools such as maps, pilot manuals, signals manuals and other guides. Inspection and evaluation of ships' logbooks in order to gather relevant navigational, astronomical, magnetic, and other observations.
The jurisdiction of the Main Hydrographic Office included the management of: Pilotage instructions and navigational instruments workshops in St. Petersburg and Nikolaev The Russian Maritime Observatory in Kronstadt and Nikolaev. The weather stations on the shores of the Russian seas. The maritime semaphore telegraph in Kronstadt. The signal stations in Nikolaev, Bogdanovka, Parutino, Adzhigol and Ochakov.
The period between 1885 and 1917 was characterized by full-scale construction and modernization of lighthouse equipment, compass technology and improvements in the printing of nautical charts. The 1910–1915 Arctic Ocean Hydrographic Expedition, led by Rear Admiral Boris A. Vilkitsky on icebreakers Vaygach and Taymyr mapped the last blank areas of the northern coast of Eastern Siberia —which were the last unmapped coastal areas of Eurasia, and gathered as well a vast amount of oceanographic and meteorological data.The Arctic Ocean Hydrographic Expedition 1910–1915
The heads of the Main Hydrographic Office were: Konstantin Mikhailov (1898–1903) Yakov Gilterbrandt (1903–1907) Andrey Vilkitsky (1907–1913) M. Y. Zhdanko (1913–1917)
The Soviet period (1917–1992)
After the initial period of instability that followed the 1917 Russian Revolution against the Imperial Government, the Hydrographic Office slowly returned to its duties as the situation calmed down and the Soviet takeover was completed. The work and dedication of hydrographers such as Konstantin Neupokoev, ensured that the service returned to normality.Синюков, В. В. Александр Васильевич Колчак : Учёный и патриот : в 2 ч. / В. В. Синюков; отв. ред. А. П. Лисицын; Ин-т истории естествознания и техники им. С. И. Вавилова РАН. — М.: Наука, 2009. — (ч. 2), С. 34 Czarist names and symbols were quickly removed, the former hydrographic institution being renamed as the 'Main Hydrographic Office of the Russian Republic' —Главное гидрографическое управление Российской Республики.
Between 1918 and 1922 hydrometeorological service units named Ubek (Убек) were established for the management of navigation safety measures. The Ubek regulated the particular hydrographic zone —in Arkhangelsk for example it was 'Ubek-North'— as part of the unified local authority directly responsible to the central Soviet government.
In 1924 the Hydrographic Office was renamed the 'Central Hydrographic Department of the USSR' and a set of new flags and pennants was issued. Barely two years later, in September 1926, the office underwent another name change; the new name was "Hydrographic Department of the Office of Naval Forces of the Workers' and Peasants' Red Army" (UVMS Hydrographic Department of the Red Army) —Гидрографический отдел Управления Военно-морских сил Рабоче-крестьянской Красной Армии. In 1927 the name was simplified to 'Hydrographic Office UVMS Red Army' —Гидрографическое управление УВМС РККА.
Emperor Nicholas II Land first partially charted by Boris Vilkitsky in 1913, but still not fully surveyed when it was renamed Severnaya Zemlya by the Presidium of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR in 1926, was the last blank area on the vast map of the Soviet Union. Vilkitsky's expedition, which in 1913 sighted and surveyed a section of the eastern coastline of what he assumed was a single landmass, had to concentrate on the Siberian continental shore in order to prepare the way for the Northeast Passage and he had no means to make a comprehensive survey further north.Alfred S. McLaren, Unknown Waters: A First-Hand Account of the Historic Under-ice Survey of the Siberian Continental Shelf by USS Queenfish (SSN-651), University of Alabama Press 2008, , p. 130 Finally a hydrographic expedition of the Arctic Institute of the USSR led by Georgy Ushakov and Nikolay Urvantsev thoroughly surveyed the large Severnaya Zemlya archipelago in 1930–32, making it the last sizable territory on Earth to be put on the map.
In 1935 the Ubek were replaced by hydrographic offices subordinate to the commander of the fleets and flotillas. In 1937 the 'Hydrographic Office UVMS Red Army' was renamed the "Hydrographic Office of the Workers' and Peasants' Navy" —Гидрографическое управление Рабоче-крестьянского Военно-морского флота (РК ВМФ). The design of the flags and pennants used by the office also underwent changes.
In 1940 the Hydrographic Office was renamed 'Hydrographic Office of the Navy' —Гидрографическое управление ВМФ. The following year, owing to the dire situation of the Great Patriotic War (1941–1945), a Task Force in the Hydrographic Department of the Navy was formed in Moscow by the Chief of the General Staff in order to deal more effectively with the emergency matters caused by the war in Russian soil and waters.