The ceremonial events took place at the State Memorial Museum of the Defense and Siege of Leningrad in St. Petersburg and the Victory Museum in Moscow. The unique “Cable of Life” was manufactured in besieged Leningrad for laying a power line along the bottom of Lake Ladoga, which made it possible to break through the energy blockade of the city in 1942.

The ceremony in St. Petersburg was attended by the city governor Alexander Beglov, the director general of Rosseti Andrey Ryumin, and the director of the State Memorial Museum of the Defense and Siege of Leningrad Elena Lezik.

“During the difficult years of the blockade, our power engineers accomplished a real feat. In 48 days, a cable was laid along the bottom of Ladoga, which began supplying the city with electricity. The first current was given on September 23, 1942 - the energy blockade of the city was broken”, said Governor Alexander Beglov.

“Laying the “Cable of Life” along the bottom of Lake Ladoga is a real feat that became possible thanks to the courage and heroism of all who performed it. Today we have the opportunity to once again express our deep gratitude to our colleagues - the Leningrad power engineers. In one of the most difficult and cruel periods of the war, they returned light to the besieged city, along with the people’s faith in Victory”, pointed out Andrey Ryumin.

As part of today’s event, Andrey Mayorov, First Deputy General Director - Chief Engineer of Rosseti, also handed over a fragment of the “Cable of Life” to the exposition of the Victory Museum on Poklonnaya Gora in Moscow.

For reference:

·       With the beginning of the war, Leningrad was cut off from the main power plants - transport stopped, the lights disappeared in the houses, the water supply stopped working. Electricity was barely enough even for bakeries and defense needs. To break the energy blockade, a project was launched to restore supplies from the Volkhovskaya HPP.

·       The most difficult stage involved laying cable lines along the bottom of Lake Ladoga at a depth of 18–20 m. Lenenergo specialists developed a unique technology: due to constant shelling, the entire insert (22.5 km) was pre-assembled and placed in the hold of the barge, and the laying work proceeded at night.

·       On September 23, 1942, the energy blockade of Leningrad was broken. The “Volkhovskaya HPP - Leningrad Ladozhskaya” line existed until May 15, 1944 and managed to transfer more than 30 million kWh of electricity to the besieged city.