As a rule, the Black Sea does not freeze in winter. But it happens that winter temperatures drop so low that the sea off the coast in the northwestern part freezes for a short time. The climate of the Black Sea is mainly continental.
The weather over the Black Sea is significantly influenced by Atlantic Ocean, over which arises most of cyclones bringing bad weather and storms to the sea.
Sea water is a natural aqueous solution of various salts, in which the bulk of the ions are sodium, magnesium, potassium, calcium, chlorine, sulfur, and also contains suspended solids, dissolved gases, and some organic compounds.
The presence of dissolved salts in seawater affects the freezing point of water. Sea water, which has an average salinity for the oceans (3.5%), freezes at -1.9 degrees Celsius. So we note that the waters of the Black Sea, as a rule, are not subject to freezing.
But in history there are cases when the Black Sea froze.
Let's look at them:
The first information about an unusually harsh winter and that the Black Sea was partially frozen is found in the letters of Ovid, a poet of ancient times, exiled at the beginning of the 1st century BC. e. in the lower Danube. He writes: “...Thrice the Istr (Danube) became cold from the cold, and three times the wave of the sea became hard.”
From other, more recent reports about unusual cold weather in the Black Sea region, we learn a lot of interesting things:
-In winter 400-401. “...the Bosporus and Dardanelles straits and most of the Black Sea froze for 20 days. In the spring, mountains of ice flowed through the streets of Constantinople for 30 days.”
-In the winter of 557-558.“...The Black Sea was covered with ice over a large area.”
Byzantine, Arab and Western European chronicles indicate that in 763-764“...winter is brutal. From the beginning of October there was a great, cruel cold not only in our land (Byzantium), but also in the east, north, west, so that the northern part of the Pontic (Black) Sea, 100 miles from the coast, turned into stone... And the same happened from Zikkhia ( Taman Peninsula) to the Danube, from the Kufis River (Kuban) to the Dniester and Dnieper, from all other banks to Media. When the snow fell on such thick ice, its thickness increased further, and the sea took on the appearance of dry land. And they walked along it as if on dry land from the Crimea to Thrace and from Constantinople to Scutari.” In February, the ice split into pieces, like great mountains. There were so many crystal blocks rushing from the Black Sea that they formed a huge ice bridge in the Bosphorus.
The winter was extremely strong 1233-34. A number of authors confirm that the northern part of the Black Sea is frozen.
Winter 1543-44 was exceptionally cold for many European countries - Germany, France, countries Northern Black Sea region. The north of the Black Sea is covered with ice.
According to the South Russian Chronicle, in Rus' “there was great snow and a severe winter with frosts, from which many Swedes died,” and the northern part of the Black Sea froze.
-They call winter “Great” 1788-89 In Crimea, frosts reached -25 degrees, in the Northern Black Sea region “the winter was cruel, full of frosts, people crawled out of their huts through the roofs because of the great snow,” and the northern part of the Black Sea froze. It was this winter, on December 6, in the bitter cold, that the Russian army stormed the Ochakov fortress.
winter 1953-54. is rightly called the “winter of the century.” On the southern coast of Crimea, frosts lasted for three months in a row, average monthly temperature February was 10-12 degrees below normal; in Yalta, the depth of snow cover during this period exceeded 30 centimeters. The Azov Sea froze completely, stable road traffic was opened through the Kerch Strait, and the northern part of the Black Sea froze.
So, over the past 2 thousand years, more than 20 “strong” winters have been recorded in the Black Sea region. The time interval between them is on average 75 years (in most cases from 60 to 90 years).
Stunning photos of the frozen Black Sea. by Dmytro Dokunov 
frozen sea
The familiar coastline was cluttered with flat, rather thick ice floes, glowing in the place of breakages with the green-blue glass of the Black Sea water; on top they were sugar-white, and one could walk on them without slipping; but it was difficult to climb from one uplifted ice floe to another; sometimes I had to sit on the raised edge of one ice floe, lowering my legs to another, or jump, resting one hand on the broken edge, which looked fragile, but in fact was as strong as granite. It was necessary to walk through this chaos for quite a long time before one’s foot set foot on a flat field of sea frozen to the very horizon. However, it was not easy to walk along this seemingly flat expanse of ice: every now and then on the way there were adhesions between individual ice floes, small hummocks and ripples of a wave suddenly captured by frost and turned into an ice floe.
All the way to the horizon, under the bright, cold sun, shining like Captain Hatteras’s mercury bullet, the untouched whiteness of the salty, coarsely frosted ice shone, and only on the very horizon was a blue-black stripe visible open sea and the silhouette of a foreign coal steamer frozen in the ice.
The ice thundered under my feet, making it clear that beneath me was a echoing, dangerous expanse of very deep water and that I was walking, as it were, along the echoing vault of a cellar, the gloomy darkness of which could be discerned beneath me in the depths.
I remember clusters of white air bubbles embedded in the ice, resembling lilies of the valley.
To the right and left, the lighthouses brightly illuminated by the January sun bulged white - one port, the other Bolshefontansky - and a small icebreaker smoking at the entrance to the Practical Harbor, reminiscent of the famous "Fram" of Fridtjof Nansen, worn down to the very masts in arctic ice, under the aurora borealis organ hanging over it. Above all this there was such a bright blue sky and there was such a high, unnatural silence and such a soft pink winter color was painted the shore of Dofinovka, impeccably clearly visible through the burning, crystal air, from which the breath spiraled and shaggy frost grew on the edges of the camel’s cap that was my head was wrapped over a school cap, so that fourteen degrees below zero according to Reaumur seemed like a temperature that was unthinkable for any living creature to withstand.
However, in the distance, moving human figures could be seen here and there on the ice field. These were townspeople taking their Sunday stroll through frozen sea, in order to take a close look at the foreign ship.
An azure shadow stretched from each person, and my shadow was especially dazzling and large, shimmering in front of me over the unevenness of the ice field and jumping over hummocks.
Finally I reached the edge of the ice, behind which, in the almost black, steaming water, stood the huge dark red hull of an Italian coal miner with a white monogram on a dirty black chimney, a monogram consisting of crossed Latin letters, which gave the steamer a strangely alluring, almost magical attractive force.
Very high on the deck stood an Italian sailor in a thick sweater, with a canvas bucket in his hand and smoking a long cheap Italian cigar with a straw at the end, and from a round hole - a Kingston from the height of a three-story building - water from the engine room continuously poured like a waterfall, leaving The old iron casing is already quite covered in ice icicles.
The Italian sailor was waving to someone, and I saw two figures moving towards the shore, who sometimes stopped and, in turn, waved to the Italian sailor. Behind them was the double azure trail of the sleds they were dragging behind them.
After walking along the edge of the ice and admiring the Italian coal miner, I headed back. The sun has already noticeably inclined to the west, beyond the city, beyond the white roofs with columns of smoke, beyond the blue dome of the city theater, beyond the monument to Duke.
The frost intensified every minute.
I mechanically walked along the long double trail of the sled and suddenly, very close to the shore, I saw on the surface of an obliquely reared ice floe with a green break some kind of inscription, deeply and coarsely carved with something sharp, perhaps the end of an iron cane from one of those that people liked to take take our artisans and factory workers along for a Sunday walk.
Maybe they made these iron canes with a round handle for themselves.
For the first time in my life, I read on an ice floe a combination of words that were not entirely clear to me:
“Proletarians of all countries, unite!”
There was something menacing and full of some secret meaning in this azure luminous phrase, which subsequently spread so widely and powerfully throughout our land.
What could this spell mean, which in an instant seemed to bring me closer to the people of all countries? - I thought with inexplicable anxiety.
Jumping from the last ice floe onto the icy stones of the shore, I saw three border soldiers in hoods and caps with green bands, who were climbing along sharp hummocks, heading towards the Italian steamer. The pink sun glittered on the tips of their blued tetrahedral bayonets with hollows for blood drainage.
They looked like people who were late.
What could all this mean and what did it have to do with the word “Spark”, which was carved on the last ice floe, probably with the same homemade iron cane by one of those who were carrying something on their sled, wrapped in matting.
Chapter five. Story by Kim Klinov. A squadron of minesweepers on a harsh and long voyage. Storm in the Bering Sea. The sea is a school of life and courage On an unusually sunny and warm day, which is rare on the Kola Peninsula, in mid-July 1952, a squadron of minesweepers left
For those who are at sea Dream from the 21st to the 22nd. I am leading some kind of vessel or ship in a completely unfamiliar sea. And suddenly I discover: there are no maps on board - neither in the chart room, nor in the map storage room. And there is no globe. Horror, nightmare. I wake up wet, I took a smoke break. And ten more times a nightmare
THE SEA I saw the sea for the first time almost half a century ago. I remember the train took us for a long time from north to south to my mother’s new place of work - to the Black Sea. I remember my brothers and I fell asleep and woke up with the only thought: “How warm and fabulous it is, on the shores of which we will now be
Chapter 7. About the rivers flowing into the eastern sea from the mouth of the Avacha to the south to the Kuril Lopatka, and from the Kuril Lopatka into the Penzhina Sea to the Tigil and to the Empty River From the mouth of the Avachi River to the Lopatka itself there are no notable rivers, because the ridge that Kamchatka is divided,
Sea I walked by the sea. How tender was the sapphire color of the wave. The sea breathed life and freshness Even into dead boulders, It burst straight into the heart with the power of Beauty that was seething around. But the sea suddenly seemed to me like a great mass grave. Under bottomless blue water, in menacing years, without
“Only sea and sea. Where is ours today..." Only sea and sea. Where is ours today? Torn away from tomorrow, lost yesterday... At that moment when they removed and abandoned the gangplank And calmly sailed home
Sea Sea, sea - as if there is no land, As if there is no cherished pier... Sea, sea... And in its distance the radiant sky begins. Somewhere, in this blue abyss, a slightly noticeable dot turned white, maybe a large ship passed by, maybe just a seagull
Severe frosts also reached the Black Sea coast. In the areas of Kerch, Evpatoria, and Odessa, the water turned to ice. On the beaches, crumbs of ice float in the water, and small icebergs can be seen 100 meters from the shore.
Due to the current situation, maritime traffic in Ukrainian ports is closed until February 15. The Romanian port of Constanta is closed, and ice thickness on the beaches reaches 40 centimeters. Both Romania and Bulgaria announced a “yellow” and “orange” danger code.
However, the inhabitants of these countries do not despair: they use frozen water as an ice skating rink, and build sculptures from ice and snow. The last time such weather anomalies occurred was in 1977, when the Black Sea off the coast of Odessa completely froze.
Photo: Frozen Black Sea near Constanta, Romania
An icy ship off the coast of Evpatoria.
http://bigpicture.ru/?p=254667
01.03.2011
According to the Hydrometeorological Center of the Black and Azov Seas. “This winter has been marked by sharp and prolonged cold, which has led to the freezing of water near the coast. This phenomenon occurs extremely rarely. The last time the sea froze completely off the coast of Odessa was in 1977.”
For the third time since the beginning of winter, the Azov Sea also became icy. The ice thickness in some places reaches 20 cm; ice blocks up to 5-10 m high washed up to the village of Sedovo, Novoazovsky district, and lined up along the entire coastline. Due to strong winds, ferry flights from Crimea to Russia are temporarily limited.
The thickness of the ice in the coastal zone is about 20 cm. It can easily support the weight of an adult, but there are no people willing to walk on the ice in such weather.
Well, if 1977 is still preserved in the memory of old-timers, then archival and literary sources say that over the past two millennia in the Black Sea region there have been more than 20 “cruel” winters with an average interval of 78 years (from 60 to 90 years ). The first information about an unusually harsh winter, in particular that the Black Sea was partially frozen, is found in the letters of Ovid, a poet of ancient times, exiled at the beginning of the 1st century. BC e. in the lower Danube. Ovid writes: “...Thrice the Ister (Danube) became cold from the cold, and three times the wave of the sea became hard.”
There are other more recent reports of unusual cold in the Black Sea region. So, for example, in the winter of 400-401. “...the Bosporus and Dardanelles straits and most of the Black Sea froze for 20 days. In the spring, mountains of ice flowed through the streets of Constantinople for 30 days.”
In the winter of 557-558. “...The Black Sea was covered with ice over a large area.”
Byzantine, Arab and Western European chronicles indicate that in 763-764. “...winter is brutal. From the beginning of October there was a great severe cold not only in our land (Byzantium), but also in the east, north, west, so that the northern part of the Pontic (Black) Sea, 100 miles from the coast, turned into stone... And the same thing happened from Zikkhia (Taman Peninsula) to the Danube, from the Kufis River (Kuban) to the Dniester and Dnieper, from all other banks to Media. When the snow fell on such thick ice, its thickness increased further, and the sea took on the appearance of dry land. And they walked along it as if on dry land from the Crimea to Thrace and from Constantinople to Scutari.”
The winter of 1233-1234 was extremely severe throughout the Mediterranean. According to Arago, “... loaded carts moved on ice across the Adriatic Sea near Venice.” A number of other authors confirm that many lagoons of the Mediterranean and the northern part of the Black Sea have frozen.
Two hundred years earlier in 1010 - 1011. frost has shackled the current Turkish coast Black Sea. Terrible cold reached Africa (!), the lower reaches of the Nile were frozen in ice.
Winter 1543-1544 It was also exceptionally cold for many European countries - Germany, France, and the countries of the Northern Black Sea region. The north of the Black Sea is covered with ice. It was so cold in France that it was necessary to “crack” the wine that had frozen in large barrels.
In the chronicles of 1708-1709 we read: “...An unusually harsh, snowy and prolonged winter throughout Europe,” the bays of the Adriatic Sea froze completely, in Venice the air temperature dropped to -20C, “many thousands of people died from the cold, orange trees cracked.” " In the same year, the winter in France and Switzerland was unusually cold; strong ice cover was observed on the Thames, Seine, and Rhone. In the Baltic Sea, the ice thickness reached 80 cm.
At the end of the 18th century. in Rus' “there was great snow and a severe winter with frosts, from which many Swedes died,” the northern part of the Black Sea froze. Chroniclers call the winter of 1788-1789 “Great”. There was severe cold throughout Europe: in France (-21C), in Italy (-15C), “severe frosts and snowfalls” in Switzerland, cold weather in Germany, the Vistula froze a month earlier and opened up a month later than usual. In Crimea, frosts reached -25C - in the Northern Black Sea region, “the winter was cruel, full of frost, people crawled out of their huts through the roofs because of the great snow,” and the northern part of the Black Sea froze.
The winter of 1875-1876 was exceptionally harsh, long and heavy with snow in Central and Eastern Europe. The number of snow avalanches has sharply increased in the mountains of Switzerland. Almost all southern rivers were covered with ice much earlier than usual, catastrophic drifts were observed on Caucasian roads, and the Black Sea froze again.
The harshest winter of the twentieth century. the winter of 1953-1954 is considered. Severe, unprecedented cold from November to April occurred over a vast territory from Spain and France to the Ural Range. On the southern coast of Crimea, frosts lasted for three months in a row, the average monthly temperature in February was 10-12C below normal, in Yalta the snow depth exceeded 30 cm, in the Caspian Sea floating ice reached the Absheron Peninsula. The Azov Sea froze completely, stable road traffic was opened through the Kerch Strait, and the northern part of the Black Sea froze.
By the way, the winter of 1962-1963 is remembered for its bitter frosts and fierce snowstorms. Ice bound the usually unfrozen Danish Strait, and the canals of Venice and the rivers of France froze again. The season of 1968-1969 was also named “Winter of Furious Frosts”.
In 2002, due to frost in Germany, ship traffic along the Main-Danube Canal, an important European waterway, was completely stopped. The thickness of the ice in which more than 20 ships were frozen reached 70 cm in some places.
At the same time, due to severe cold, the Venice lagoon froze and the gondolas were frozen into ice. The same frosts occurred in Venice in 1985.
At the end of 2005, most countries in Central and Western Europe were also hit by heavy snowfalls. In Germany and the Netherlands, unusually cold temperatures for this time of year led to icing and downed power lines. In Paris, the Eiffel Tower, France's main attraction, was closed for several hours due to icing.
As for the current situation, according to forecasters, ice in the coastal zone Sea of Azov will last until the second decade of March. In the Odessa region, the sea will clear in the coming days.
Ice cover in the Black Sea It often forms only on the northern coasts, and then only in relatively harsh winters. Ice usually does not appear off the Caucasian and Anatolian coasts. Almost every year the Dnieper-Bug and Dniester estuaries, lakes near the Danube delta and on the northwestern coast freeze. In very cold winters, the Danube River is covered with ice, and in some cases, the coastal strip of the sea. During the period of ice drift, the current carries the ice south to the Bulgarian shores; usually they reach Cape Kaliakra, and in rare cases they go down further south. In exceptionally harsh winters, when the sea freezes off the Bulgarian coast, broken ice carries even into the Bosphorus and Eregli.
Off the coast of Crimea, ice usually forms up to Cape Tarkhankut, and broken ice reaches Evpatoria. Ice carried out from the Sea of Azov often appears near the Kerch Strait and reaches Anapa in the eastern direction and Feodosia in the western direction.
The first information about ice formations on the Black Sea is given by Herodotus; he mentions that the Cimmerian Bosphorus (Kerch Strait) and Maeotis (Azov Sea) are often covered with a fairly thick layer of ice, which, breaking in the spring, is carried into the Pontus (Black Sea). The Roman poet Ovid, exiled to Lesser Scythia (Dobrudzha), writes that in the period from 7 to 17, for three winters, the Danube and coastal sea waters froze over a significant extent. Nolian (III century) reports about frequent freeze-ups on the Danube. Significant freezing of the Black Sea observed in 401. Amian Marcelinus writes that almost the entire sea froze, in the spring the ice fields filled the Bosphorus, and from it they came out into the Sea of Marmara and floated there for about a month. Byzantine sources mention the freezing of the Bosphorus in 739, 753 and 755. In 755, ice formed in the Sea of Marmara and blocked the Dardanelles.
The most intense ice formation, in 762, was reported by Patriarch Nikephoros and the chronicler Codrinus: the Black Sea froze approximately 100 miles from land, even in the area of the Anatolian coast. From Mesemvriy (Nessebar) it was possible to walk across the ice to the Caucasian coast.
Freeze-up in the Bosphorus was observed in 928 and 934. In 1011, not only the Bosphorus froze, but also part of the Sea of Marmara. At the same time, great cold occurred in Syria and Egypt, ice appeared in the lower reaches of the Nile River. The northern part of the Black Sea froze, according to the testimony of Prince Gleb Svyatoslavich, in 1068.
Ice appeared southern shores the Black Sea and the Bosphorus and in 1232, 1621, 1669 and 1755. In 1813, the Black Sea was covered with ice off the northern shores up to southern regions Crimea. The Bosphorus froze in 1823, 1849 and 1862.
In 1929, 1942 and 1954. ice formed almost along the entire Bulgarian coast, and at the same time ice penetrated into the Bosphorus. Freeze-up in the north-western part of the Black Sea and in the Sea of Azov and strong ice drift on the Danube in 1972 caused the appearance of ice fields off the Bulgarian coast even south of the cape Kaliakra. But persistent winds from land carried them to the open sea.
The appearance of ice and slush in the shallow parts of the bays of the Bulgarian coast was observed in other years. Lakes located near the sea coast freeze much more often.
Ice formed from seawater contains less salt than water did. During education sea ice between ice crystals consisting of clean water, small drops of sea water (brine) are retained. Over time, the brine
falls down, the ice is desalinated, and air bubbles appear in it, creating its porosity.
Fresh waters freeze at 0° C, salted ones - at lower temperatures. In the oceans, water freezes at a temperature of -1.9 to -2 °C, in the Black Sea - at a temperature of -0.9 °C, but only in calm weather. With strong waves, ice crystals form in the water - ice porridge, and the water temperature can be about -1.1 or -1.2 ° C.
The salinity of the lower part of the ice immersed in water is higher than that of the upper part, even freshwater ice, caught in the sea, the lower part is saturated with sea water.
The salinity of the upper layers of sea ice is negligible. When ice ages chemical composition it changes - the amount of chlorides decreases and the amount of bicarbonates increases.
In general, ice cover contains significantly less salts than seawater.
Among the southern and western Slavs, Mora is a demon who strangles and torments a sleeping person, falling on his chest at night.
Poles and Kashubians believe that if six or seven daughters are born in a row in a family, the last one becomes Mora.
According to Czech beliefs, children born with teeth become Mora, and according to Serbian and Croatian beliefs, children born with a “shirt”, usually bloody or blue, become Mora.
The Serbs believe that Mora is a girl who was born in a bloody shirt, which the midwife burned in a fire.
Serbs and Croats also believe that Mora is the daughter of a Veštica, and also that Moras are children conceived by a woman on a holiday or during her period.
According to Polish beliefs, the girl who produces Mora has two souls - good and evil, while the evil soul flies out of the body of the sleeping Mora and harms people, but Mora herself does not suspect anything.
Mora's demonic properties manifest themselves at night, and the rest of the time she is no different from those around her.
Western Slavs believe that Moras strangle people against their will when their time comes.
According to Bulgarian and Polish beliefs, Moras are the souls of people who died without confession, were buried in violation of the funeral ritual, as well as children of unbaptized or incorrectly baptized infants.
Poles, Czechs and Lusatians also have beliefs about Moras - men.
The Poles believe that Mora is invisible or looks like a vaguely visible human shadow, she has a transparent body, she is thin, bony, and has abnormally long legs, arms, and nails.
According to Serbian beliefs, Mora can take the form of a moth or mosquito, as well as animals associated with other world: bat, cat, mouse.
Mora climbs onto the chest of a sleeping person, crushes and tortures him, drinks his blood, and sucks milk from women's breasts.
According to some beliefs, there are several varieties of Pestilence: one sucks and strangles people, another sucks the sap of trees, the third sucks vegetables and weeds.
Mora's victim turns pale, withers and soon dies.
Mora can enter a room through any, even the smallest, opening, including a keyhole.
Poles and Kashubians believe that Mora moves in a sieve, on a broom, a wheel from a wheelbarrow, a reel, a spinning wheel (cf.
Spinning wheel) or in a cart with one wheel.
As amulets against Mora, a knife, a needle stuck into clothing, an ax or other iron object, garlic, a belt placed on top of a blanket, bread, and a mirror are used.
To stop visiting Mora, you need to recognize her.
To do this, the person whom Mora is strangling must tell her: “Come in the morning, I will give you bread and salt.”
The first woman to come in the morning will be Mora.
She needs to give what she promised, after which she will no longer come to this house.
You can get rid of Mora by catching the animal she turned into and crippling it.
A newborn with teeth was given a piece of wood in his mouth so that the child’s harmfulness would be transferred to it.
Mora comes from double-minded people.
The Polish pestilence is strangling sleeping people.
The Croats baptized the mora with a fig three times, after spitting on it, which tormented the child.
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