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Something more.

After NRozdil and Kalush we've been to Drohobych-Boryslav-Stebink but it was a very unsuccessful day: we wanted to visit two abandoned chemical plants, Halol (lubricants) and Hallak (paints) but guardians forbidden us to take any pictures... as always! >:(


Then we've visited oil derricks in Boryslav and Stebnik potash mines ruins.


Another day we've been to Novoyavorivsk to see the huge excavator which is ready to be demolished like his twin was. Interesting site but too many people working on site, and hot weather.



Then the last two days, probably the most exciting ones of the entire trip. :) We've been to Chervonograd and Sokal', to visit coal mines and the viscose factory. I took many pictures and still need to look at them, but something I can upload already. We had a great time with Linuxoid and Redshift, even if our driver was drunk and caught by police, and disappeared with the car and our bags, etc.. unbelievable story!  :-\

First mine we've visited, active but currently not working. We've visited the whole site without the chance to take pictures, but once outside I took a quick one.  ;)


Then we've been to Lisova mine, where Redshift is employed: unforgettable experience to visit an active coal mine! Some videos here on Youtube. Here one of the shafts.




One more mine, this time abandoned. A very beautiful site, with kind guardians (strange?!?!) and nice atmosphere.

Next day was spent between Sokal' viscose factory. I enjoyed pretty much that site, and will upload some pictures and process informations soon, as this factory used to have many connection with Italian companies. Social picture outside the plant (from left: my friend Drex, Linuxoid, Redshift and me).


And finally we climbed the amazing terrikon of Chervonograds'ka mine n.2. Wonderful place and emotions there, with the sunset on the Polish horizon. The giant ropeway is a unique structure, never seen something similar! Amazing, amazing, amazing!  ;D








That's all for now!

Cheers
M.

So, let's start with the first 4 days spent between Novyi Rozdil and Kalush. I had great expectations from these places but I must say that, for many reasons, they ensured quite a lot of disappointment. Main problem I think it was represented by the ongoing (unofficial) demolition processes on site along with the presence of guardians: a complete different situation in front of previous visits by forum's people (I mean Novyi Rozdil in 2009 and Kalush in early spring 2011). The sulphur kombinat of NRozdil is almost a ruin, having just a few nice spots to take panorama pictures of the beautiful built ensemble. The NPK (nitroammofoska) plant is also a ruin, with the most interesting stuff already destroyed (for example the sulphuric acid plant = "metal octopus") and many people doing their "job" on site. Hot and sunny weather didn't help us into exploring too.

View onto the power station.


Enrichment plant and sulphur deposits.


Soviet-style warning signs, lovely!


Sulphuric acid exhaust smokes chimney.


NPK complex.


Panorama with village and the two parts of Sirka kombinat.


Novyi Rozdil former theater.


Old lady on the road.


The lake of Tarzan. ;)


Faces you must know...  :P


After NRozdil we moved to Kalush, where still stands the most interesting of the places on our travel list: the Potash-Magnesium Kombinat. Unfortunately, as said up there by the others, we met a guardian (living inside a ruined building?!?!?) who forbidden us to proceed inside. Extremely disappointing his presence!!!! :'(

The Kombinat profile.


Kalush power station.


Then, after the fucked-up Kalush objects, we moved back to Lviv making two stops: in Dolyna and Dashava. In the first one we've spent some time (more would have be better) in the oil field, which was really interesting to see in reality. It looked like somewhere in Texas, with the strong sun on us.  8)





Second stop was unfortunately very short, as we proceed to get inside Dashava carbon black factory and soon we met the guardian. F**K.



Some considerations and suggestions. Me and my friend Drex we're used to explore and visit abandoned factories in a very different way from how you do it, maybe because the situation there is very different from what we're used to. For example, we always try to visit a place without going first to guardians, as at 90% they forbid us to enter and take pictures. Moreover, we found out that in Ukraine there is a general scary of photo cameras and tripods, especially when you're close to an industrial ruin. Linuxoid described it perfectly as "Soviet-mode", a mental heritage of the USSR years. Without the help of you guys of course it was impossible even to speak with those guardians, but in different occasions there was a good chance of exploring without being caught or seen. I'm not speaking of NRozdil, that is a very strange situation (never seen before), but for example in Kalush there was no need to be seen by the guardian if we walked just straight without stop in front of his "house". More, in Dashava we entered from the back, the site was full of trees and vegetation, good for hiding, and you walked just on the main street and when you had hear the noise of the car you just stayed there waiting for it. me and Drex we were ready to jump into vegetation and wait for the car to go away. In this case we could have visited the place without any problem.
These are just some suggestion. We also found out that usually guardians don't ask to cancel your pictures (maybe they don't even know how a camera works?!) or call the police, they just say that you can't stay there. So, that's a good point to try to visit places without walk in the hand of guardians. If they catch you, in the end, you can just say sorry and go outside, but with some pictures already made. Isn't it wiser? :)

I'll proceed with other visited things down there in the next hours/days.

Hi  :)

in the upcoming days I'll add to this topic some of my pictures and impressions about the trip, which has been an extraordinary life experience for us! We enjoyed very much Lviv and the region, industry, landscapes and of course people! A special mention goes to Stepan (bottlehunter), Vitaliy (linuxoid) and Yura (red shift) for their help and knowledge: without you guys I think it was almost impossible for us to do anything. ;)

About objects on program: I enjoyed especially Novyi Rozdil town and kombinat, Dolyna oil fields and of course the last two days in Chervonograd/Sokal'. The biggest loss was for sure the Kalush kombinat, a place I really wanted to explore in depth but it went wrong... :'(
Anyway, now we know very much about the "Soviet mode" in abandoned factories: too much guardians you have, and when they see a camera they turn on their "Soviet mode" and transform a normal industrial ruin into a top-secret location. Totally weird!!! :o

We want to visit Ukraine again in the future, maybe as more official as possible (I mean official permissions with private companies and owners). We are particularly interested into visiting the central industrial region between Kryvyj Rih and Dnipropetrovsk and of course Donbass.

And of course I forgot to mention that Lviv is a wonderful city, we enjoyed very much the old town, its caf?s and restaurants!


Soon pictures and impressions about visited objects!  ;)

My previous post is not actual, I've found friend on one of active mines 8)

I knew you will succeed! ;)
Looking forward to be there!

I have tried to deal with managers of active mines and they have prohibited all trips on teritory of mine. Probably, they doing something secret and do not whant to show it, it is joke.

Ouch! What a pity.. :-\
Even on surface is not possible?  ???
Can you give your email? I have something to show you that can be useful for permissions, thought.
(btw, I added you on ICQ)

Italian invasion... ;D

Hi, momastalker.
1) I don`t know about sulphuric acid plant, because we did not walk there. We see destroyed only four plate near first build with screws.

2) So they exactly there, near a "gipseous hill". Yes we been in other buildings in that site, but in others buildings, that we visited, is in a very bad situation. Machineries left in other buildings are the usually destroyed but the big machineries are stand in there.

P.S. Sorry for my English.

Thanks for reply!

I'm pretty sure the the sulphuric acid plant is gone, I mean this "metal octopus": .
It was pretty huge and I can't see it in your panorama pictures, sigh! :'( And I remember I found on the net some news about metal scrapping, saying the the owner of the site needs to pay his debts and used the metal for that...  :-\

Hi Drusja,
very interesting update! As I'll be there next week, I would like to ask you some things:
1) is the sulphuric acid plant completely demolished? (I mean the one in the mineral fertilizers factory, still existing in 2009)
2) the rotating drum vacuums are marvellous! never seen pictures of them before! I localized the building in which they're located (close to the gypsum hill), and have you been in other buildings in that site? or just this one? and one more, are there other machineries left in other buildings?

thanks!  ;)


ps: the site looks amazing, indeed! :o

And it makes only heat - turbines had not installed - USSR was broken.

That's interesting to hear, I though it had turbines.
BTW, I wonder how many things have been left unfinished because of USSR crack down.  ;)

2 momastalker:
We met guards and thay don't wanna to go with us inside work teritory.

ok, now is crystal clear! thanks!

Interesting stuff the power plant 2! 8)
I tried to translate with google translator but probably I miss the reason why you refused to get into the power plant, as you've been so close to the building itself. Is it active or guarded? (doesn't seem so..).

Hi everyone,

just a question: does someone of you know about a carbon black factory in Dashava (ДАШАВСКИЙ ЗАВОД ТЕХНИЧЕСКОГО УГЛЕРОДА) ?

it's located in the north of the village, seems abandoned..


I'm curious to see how it looks like.


Cheers
M.

Deutsch sprechen hier, gro?artig!  ;)

@ Roy, Lesyk : ok, hope to meet you then!  :)

Also, can organise sally to surface of coal mine (probably and underground. but I can't to promise it, because it very hard to arrange).

Hi Linuxoid,
I've seen your last amazing underground trip in the active coal mine, what I can say : spectacular!  ::)
I've visited many coal mines in France and Germany (Ruhr region), but never been in the underground. If to arrange another visit you need some references from me and my friend (picture portfolio about industrial culture) just tell me, we will provide you a copy by email. However, we will print some copies to bring with us, in case of guardians or security to prove that we are seriously interested in industry.
Even some pictures like those ones are enough for us: http://polar-bird.livejournal.com/516397.html
Pure mining industry!

Stepan said it all.  :)

We are glad to meet everyone who is interested into join us!

Objects of our journey are industrial abandoned plants and industrial landscapes, in such travel order:
- New Rozdil sulphur refinery
- New Rozdil mineral fertilizers factory
- Dashava carbon black factory (never seen on explorer)
- Kalush potash kombinat
- Kalush potash mines
- Kalush Oriana petrochemical plant (as far as I know it is active, just outside shots)
- oil derricks in Dolyna
- Javoriv excavators (if still there, I saw demolitions.. )
- potash mines in Stebnik
- oil refineries in Drohobych (active, outside shots)
- viscose factory in Sokal
- coal mines in Chervonohrad


Here we are 8)

(in a former photographic film factory in Italy, similar to your SVEMA)


see ya

M

hello to everyone,
I just want to share with you a list of sugar mills I've found in western Ukraine, around Lviv. maybe some of them are abandoned and interesting...

Sambir -  49°31'41.13"N ,  23°11'47.38"E
Zadnistryans'ke -  49°11'13.10"N,  24°41'17.65"E
Zolochiv -  49°48'5.24"N,  24°51'27.88"E
Ivanychi -  50°39'2.42"N,  24°21'49.47"E
Volodymyr-Volyns'ky -  50°49'36.74"N,  24°21'25.14"E
Mar'yanivka -  50°27'10.46"N,  24°48'16.47"E
Kozova -  49°25'42.36"N,  25°10'58.49"E
Buchach -  49° 3'57.91"N,  25°20'52.65"E
Ternopil' -  49°30'36.38"N,  25°36'22.00"E

(google earth coordinates)


cheers

Marcello

There's always way inside. :) I've lived near Kalush (Dolyna, 25 km west) and often ride a bicycle in this area so I know that places pretty well. I think, you must walk for two days to see all this therritory fluently.

a way inside?! crazy!!!  ;D
should be that one, right?

Kalush is on my "to-do" list, of course.

Sorry for my bad English, I'm only learning :)

Your English is very good, I'm happy that someone speaks English there!  :)
Some friends of mine have been to Donbass a few months ago, to photograph industries and coal mines, but they didn't know anyone there, so impossible to speak with owners and guardians of factories... they've been back home without visiting any place from the inside, what a pity!  :-\

Hi Bottlehunter!
Nice to see so much interested replies to my questions!  :)
Thanks for the compliments regarding my website, I'm actually working on the new version which will be updated as soon as possible.

I will provide to give to Golem some places I've found by myself on google earth, places that are not figuring in your forum of course.

About the ones you mentioned:
1) Novojavorivsk is interesting, especially those huge excavators. They reminds me similar ones I've seen in Germany.
2) Kalush is amazing, I've discovered it by chance looking at the satellite. The magnesium factory looks promising, would like to visit it in the inside.

The chemical complex and the power plant are also great, but I think they are active... so no way inside.
I've noticed also some abandoned shafts around Kalush, probably former mines used by the magnesium plant.

Hi Golem, thanks for your quick reply!

First of all I would like to know how is the urbex situation in the region. I mean: abandoned places are guarded? is there security? or you just walk in and it's ok..? I don't know how it works in Ukraine... in Italy for example the most beautiful locations (with machineries inside) are guarded, but it's possible to get inside sometimes.
And I'm sure that in such a trip to Ukraine must be necessary to have some "local" guides, because I don't speak your language. :(

Then, I discovered a lot of factories in the region, maybe I can send them to you with coordinates... and you can tell me more if you know.  :)

Hi everyone,
hope that someone there speak english..  :)

My name is Marcello and I'm a photographer and urban explorer from Milan, Italy. My website is: www.st-al.com (old version, new one is under development). I'm active mostly in Italy, Germany and Belgium since 2004, focusing only on industrial places.


I'm going to plan a trip to Ukraine next year. I usually do my researches using Google Earth and similar. After some months of researches I've discovered quite a lot of beautiful industrial places in Ukraine: Lviv region and Donbass mostly. I've found then explorer.lviv and saw that here there are some good guys which have visited some of the sites I found on the satellite, for example the sulphur refinery in Novyi Rozdil (Новий Розділ). I would like to get in touch with some of you and share some informations and maybe find an help to organize my future trip.

Hope to receive some positive responses! ;)

Cheers
Marcello