Before the satelite communication was implemented Russian military bases located at the low-populated places such as shores of Arctic Ocean or frozen Siberian forests had to communicate somehow. It was practically impossible to connect them with wire because required too much effort, and was not secure at all – just a small cut off of the line would cause days of searching for it at -40 weather.
So Russian army has implemented the network of stations that fired their messages to ionosphere then the message was reflected from it and returned to the Earth surface – right to another station. By connecting those stations in relay chain they could communicate through all 10000 mile wide Russian land instantly.
After the sat connections came into play some of the stations were discontinued some were converted to satelite link.
Below you can see the map of this system, and the basic stations. People were sent there to serve their military service for two years guided by full time military commanders. Some still remember those times with a nice nostalgic feeling, some don’t – just imagine to live in the middle of the nowhere for couple of years with the only task to service some strange looking antenna.
Advertisement:
via tllrsever.org
1′st
OMG Russians are so poor, look at their crumbling communication infrastructure, rotting, rusting and crumbling away just like poor Russia. I feel sorry for the poor people of Russia
go away Miss India, your being pathetic.
Dennis the menace
Marks for fake Russian Miss India = -10
you always get -10 if there isn’t one redeeming feature in your post.
Miss India is the world’s cum dumpster.
I served at sites just like those when I was in the United States Air Force. On two mountain tops in Greece and one site in Turkey. Even on mobile equipment that fit on the back of a pickup truck. Awesome pics and it really shows how much we are alike, rather than how different we were. Same young people serving honorably for the old people to use.
Who can tell me why they are pointing down?
perhaps they reflect the waves to a reciever on the ground
Maybe the flat surface side of the antenna isn’t the “front” side…
The large surfaces are just reflectors, the feed horn antenna is located above the ground in front of the reflector. The angles look odd but the beam will have a takeoff angle of about 20-30 degrees
correct. It’s called “offset feed”
it has many advantages, like:
.easy access to feedpoints (the feed horns shown low down at the end of the horizontal “walkways” in some photos)
.lower noise figure as the feedhorn aims against “cold” outer space rather than the “warm” earth
.mechancal rigidity (due to feed arm being braced against the mass of the earth) helps focussing issues.
.reflectors can be easily replaced or re-aligned (within limits)
.additional off axis “skew” feeds can be fitted (though at much reduced gain)
..there are others..
Wow. Cool stuff. 2nd.
Awesome.
This is the kind of posts that make me love this website.
Like old-soviet-conspiracy-abandoned-secret stuff.
Fantastic. This is what I love about this website! Crazy, but I want to visit some of these places…
I believe this was the first guidence system for the goldeneye defense satallite.Dont believe the propaganda above!
NATO had a similar network of communications called ACE High, it was used from the 60′s till late 80′s or early 90′s. It was pretty wide, from USA till Turkey throughout Europe. When I was child I remember some huge antennas on mountains’ peak, everybody was calling them “radars” but nobody knew their real purpose, we thought it was air defense system.
After satellite communications were evolved (and became cheaper) all these projects were phased out.
And an amazing site with map of all troposcatter stations!
http://rammstein.dfmk.hu/~s200/tropo.html#ace
There is a Iron Maiden song called Aces High from the 80s
The name of the Iron Maiden song is a title taken from a WWI movie shot in 70s. I think I still have the movie somewhere…
Interesting.
The US Air Force also maintained a similar system in Alaska beginning in the mid 1950s called WHITE ALICE. The antenna shape was designed to create a directional beam while minimizing side lobe radiation. Before satellites, this was the most reliable method of providing signal traffic from intelligence stations and the DEW line to Continental US stations.
Find all soviet antenna stations here and zoom them in google maps:
rammstein.dfmk.hu/~s200/tropo.html#sever
write normally.
impressive
[...] EnglishRussia hat mal wieder ein paar empfehlenswerte Reisetipps für Sammler und Jäger. Alte verlassene Militär-Stützpunkte am Rande des arktischen Ozeans oder in den eisigen sibirischen Wäldern. Da es über diese riesigen Entfernungen zu aufwendig war, ein Kommunikationsnetzwerk über den Ether zu spannen, baute die Regierung riesige Teleskope, für die Kommunikation durch die Ionosphäre. Nachdem die Statellitenkommunikation ins Spiel kam, wurden diese Anlagen nicht mehr betrieben. Eine kleine Karte zu diesem System und Bilder gibts bei EnglishRussia. Posted by admin | Filed in Urban Exploration [...]
QUOTE “dancing to Akon, Usher or hell even that song called lolli lolli pop that body”
omg youd like that? bahaha
Whaty would make greater photo opportunity would be photo from top of these giant. They must have some amazing views.
Hey Viperman,
1) Go away
2) type russian porn girl nipples into Google
3) Do your job – which I assume is “Junior Wanking Executive”
scot
And.. being nerdy… given the issues of comms there – seems like a pretty good soltion
The only reason I post is that “lolli lolli pop that body” reminds me a line “La-di-da-di, free John Gotti” from my favorite song – “King of New York” by Fun Loving Criminals
All hail the Soviet Technocrats!!!
Interesting!
I don’t find all these abandoned sites all that amusing. Some of the wankers here need to get some grasp of human history.
And Miss India is a wanker.
Sure, this is certainly no communication antennaes, but long-distance over-the-horizon radar antennaes. If the map is correct they were used in order to spy on the Americans.
Check TROPOSCATTER on Wikipedia
I always hating theses antenna! Theys reminding me of right-most portion of Evil Amerikan flag!!! Why did they not paint them to look a like nice Russian flag??
Interesting post, and these are tropospheric scatter systems, Cool!!. Indeed they were necessary to cover this large territory, while remains unknown to me if the transmissions were encrypted cause Americans develop SIGINT satellites like the Orion, Vortex, Mercury, Ferret, Magnum, Mentor and many others to eavesdrop on this systems, part of the signals dont bounce on atmosphere so they can be picked up by the large mylar antennas of those spy satellites. Maybe they get something or at least useful to get traffic analysis details. Anyway those pics are awesome, the source page even has videos of it.
Woah, bouncing signals off the ionosphere? Awesome pictures
Bouncing signals off the Troposhpere NOT Ionosphere. Check TROPOSCATTER on Wikipedia.
But good pictures
if you’re impressed by bouncing of the _ionosphere_ , there’s no hope for you.
It’s been common practice for , oh, about 80-100 years worldwide
Huge thingies…
[...] C’è poco da dire, il sito English Russia continua a rivelarsi una miniera di diamanti per tutti gli amanti come me delle linee evolutive interrotte e abbandonate della tecnologia del XX secolo. Già la storia dei fari nucleari dismessi sulla Northern Sea Route e caduti preda di saccheggiatori di RTG ci aveva regalato manciate di sense of wonder e più moderni brividi di inquietudine. Be’, siete pronti per un nuovo giro sulla giostra dell’immaginario? E allora torniamo in Siberia, per scoprire l’altrettanto suggestiva storia dei collegamenti inosferici e delle radiostazioni a onde medie. [...]
Another enormous yet interesting russian structure. Keep posting.
Miss India are you this blog writer? You are very active and agresive commenter. Maybe “she” is a PR of this blog?
[...] Sunt din ce in ce mai impresionat de nebunia si in acelasi timp de performantele tehnologice ale fostului popor sovietic. In imaginile de mai sus/jos puteti vedea un sistem de radio telecomunicatie la mare distanta de tip pamant/ionosfera/pamant. Mai multe informatii si imagini pot fi gasite aici. [...]
oh my – how little is known ….
OK, Everybody – these are actually (most of them) – yes wait for it – microwave receivers !!! On picture number seventeen (or so) you can see the round ones which are actual transmitters. These are used for long distance line-of-sight communication – that is why they build relay stations on high mountains / hills. They are mostly used by the military for telephonic type communication which is not reliant on the civilian telecoms infrastructure. They receive quite a strong microwave signal and if you manage to park a modern car close to an active station it can really mess with the electronics.
In th4e US they had something similar during WWII. LArge tracks of land on Long Island in New York State (currently over 4000 acres as a State park formerly “RCA property”) and others one nearby another large “wireless” array near Princeton, NJ were used to send signals bounced I think off the ionosphere at night to Europe during the war. I think David Saranoff (or Saranov), then promoted to General, the RCA research center in Princeton, New Jersey today was in charge. Nearby Orson Welles landed the Martian invaders at Grovers Mill in the 1938 Halloween radio transmission of H.G. Wells “War of the Worlds”. The wire arrays, were more like gridded lines between telephone poles and did not stand out like these from what I know. The first “radio fax” of a picture was in 1924 perhaps used that way also. I was told the plans for the D-Day invasion were kept in a safe on Governors Island in NYC perhaps transmitted by ionospheric transmission too over the large networks just above the tops of “pine barrens” today preserved for rainwater recharge of aquifer.
Well you know the HAARP ?, It’s the same thing, project for ionospheric “control”, you remeber Katrina ? and the new magnetic weapon.
sorry for my english.
will those survive storm ?
looks cool anyway, like intercepting alien communication.
My grandfather worked on a similar installation for the U.S. Army in Greenland.
[...] war, wurden die anlagen eingestellt und rosten jetzt in der sibirischen weite vor sich hin. english russia hat beeindruckende fotos der gigantischen antennenanlagen [...]
I had no idea about this. Russians were actually very advanced until the end of WWII in all fields. Today however it is a different story!
[...] Airport as Pilots See ItnbspnbspDriving Skills nbspnbspFirst Western Photographer in Moscow nbspnbspRussian Ionospheric LinknbspnbspBack to the Arctics nbspnbspGiant Snake of Kazakhstan nbspnbspDon’t Mix Vodka and [...]
[...] Oroszországi Ionoszféra kutató központok (mára többségük elhagyatott) Több kép itt: EnglishRussia [...]