Electric fitter-installer of mining equipment SMU-24 Alexander Kokorin went to the front again. He is one of 65 employees of Mosmetrostroy JSC mobilized from the ranks. And today’s “Close-up” is a story about what the ordinary life of a builder was like and how it changed with the beginning of a special military operation (SVO).
Alexander Kokorin has been working at SMU-24 for the fifth year. He started as a mechanic, then mastered electrical installation. By the way, it is one of the most difficult and responsible tasks on a construction site. It’s early in the morning, the team starts their shift, signs in the log book, listens to the tasks from the site manager and goes to work. For example, in a tunnel you need to unwind a huge 320-meter reel with a power cable, lift it and fasten it with couplings.
By the way, the average weight of a reel varies from five to seven tons. It all depends on the thickness of the cable. You can unwind it on a straight section in a matter of minutes, despite its considerable weight. For example, at Sokolniki one such skein was unwound in ten minutes.
“The passage between Sokolniki and Rizhskaya was smooth, the cable was connected to the lower horn,” recalls Alexander Kokorin. “They took a Bobcat to help, which laid out the cable.
It's another matter when a thick cable needs to be pulled from above. Then you have to pull everything out literally - with outstretched arms. The only assistants are a long metal stick and their own strength. You don't need a gym while you're working on the capital's main underground construction sites.
At Maryina Roshcha, the cable had to be run upward, raising it to a height of 20 to 25 meters in order to lay it in the collectors. The station itself is unique from the point of view of its internal structure: sharp slopes, steep climbs, specialists had to use non-standard solutions in order for the entire complex to eventually work. Here, the longest escalator needed serious electrical power. And all the station systems are nowhere without power: no smoke removal, no ventilation, no air conditioning, no fire safety, or any others.
HELP
Alexander Alexandrovich Kokorin was born in the village of Kazanka, Zolotukhinsky district, Kursk region on November 18, 1988. There he graduated from secondary school. I went to college, studying to become an electrical mechanic. He served in the army, receiving the rank of sergeant. Married with children.
– Some lift, others fasten with clamps, others “ring” at the joints. This is how things progress gradually,” he describes the process. – Coupling, painting, connecting to the panels, supplying voltage, checking and you can turn on the switch. This is how metro stations receive power.
“Kuntsevskaya”, “Aviamotornaya”, “Maryina Roshcha”, “Kakhovskaya”, “Sokolniki”, “Rizhskaya” - Alexander Kokorin had a hand in the creation of several stations of the Big Circle Metro Line.
“It happened that I had to work 12 hours and into the night,” he said. – The most difficult thing is to run the cables into the switchboard. You need to go around corners and bends. The cable is thick, heavy, and needs to be pulled and bent. But we have a good, experienced team of 15 people, they always worked harmoniously.
Alexander Kokorin had the opportunity to visit the first day of the full launch of the Big Circle Line stations, and only afterwards to appreciate all the beauty and power of the new metro facilities. I worried, together with my colleagues, how the commission would receive the stations, how and when they would meet passengers. But everything went smoothly, and millions of people are already enjoying the new metro stations.
Alexander Kokorin himself calmly leaves his work areas: SMU-24 is responsible for quality. But what he worries about is his family. She had to be abandoned for the second time in the last six months.
In October 2022, he was mobilized. After a short preparation at home and at work, I spent a month studying in Naro-Fominsk. They prepared both physically and mentally - they would soon have to move to the front.
“They jumped, ran, shot, dug trenches. In mid-November we were transferred to Svatovo, “for the ribbon,” he says.
We went on guard duty. In this part of the Lugansk People's Republic last fall, arrivals from NATO guns were daily. Just before the New Year, on December 31, their military unit came under mortar fire.
“We celebrated the New Year near the X-ray,” Alexander Kokorin tries to laugh it off. He, like other colleagues, was covered with shrapnel.
They were evacuated to Belgorod, where he spent ten days in a hospital bed. There, doctors performed four operations on his crushed foot. Then there was a hospital in Ryazan, and only after that - Moscow. It took more than two more months for medical care.
In the second half of March, Alexander Kokorin again went to study in Naro-Fominsk. I am sure that victory belongs to those who go for it and strive for it with all their might.