The name of the 40 x (and 50 x) latitudes of the Southern Hemisphere, where strong steady westerly winds blow over the ocean, causing frequent storms ... Modern Encyclopedia

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ROARING FORTIETS, a name given in sailing times and still extant, for the area between 40° and 50° south latitude in the southern hemisphere, which is characterized by constant strong winds. They are called constant ... ... Scientific and technical encyclopedic dictionary

- "ROARING FORTY", the traditional name for oceanic spaces at 40 latitudes of the Southern Hemisphere, where strong and steady westerly winds blow, causing frequent storms (see STORM (storm)) ... encyclopedic Dictionary

roaring forties- A belt with a predominance of westerly storm winds at latitudes 40 50 ° of the Southern Hemisphere, where a barrier arises in the path of oceanic water masses, causing stormy weather, cloudiness and sea waves, so that these latitudes turn out to be difficult and ... ... Geography Dictionary

roaring forties- the name of the 40 x (and 50 x) latitudes of the Southern Hemisphere, where strong and stable westerly winds blow over the ocean, causing frequent storms ... Marine Biographical Dictionary

"Roaring Forties"- “ROARING FORTY”, the name of the 40 x (and 50 x) latitudes of the Southern Hemisphere, where strong steady westerly winds blow over the ocean, causing frequent storms. … Illustrated Encyclopedic Dictionary

- (“Roaring Forties”) is the traditional name for oceanic spaces in the 40th latitude of the Southern Hemisphere, where strong and stable westerly winds and frequent storms are common. Similar climate features are noted over the oceans and in the 50s ... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

The traditional name for oceanic spaces at 40 latitudes in the Southern Hemisphere, where strong and steady westerly winds blow, causing frequent storms ... encyclopedic Dictionary

The traditional name of the ocean. spaces in 40 x latitudes South. hemisphere, where strong and steady app. winds causing frequent storms… Natural science. encyclopedic Dictionary

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Mark Sofer - Ph.D. (“Interestingly about rivers, lakes, swamps”), “Entertainingly about the weather”, etc. I visited all climatic zones, on the banks of hundreds of rivers. In the USA since 2004. Lives in Brooklyn.

We are not talking about the thirties, forties or fifties of this or that century. Once, in adolescence, while reading novels about pirates and sea travelers, I noticed the name of some vast areas of the ocean: “Furious Fifties”, “Roaring Forties”, “Horse Thirties” ...

They sounded solemn and incomprehensible. Later, I learned that these oceanic latitudes bear romantic-tragic names due to ancient maritime traditions associated with the inexplicable fate of many sailing ships.
Meteorologists gave an explanation of the reasons for these names.
At all times, the life of a person at sea, especially far from the coast, was completely dependent on the vicissitudes of the weather. Even today, when steel ships are equipped with powerful engines and space navigation aids, she plays an important role in the success of navigation. Needless to say, what role the weather played in the life of sailors several centuries ago, in the era of wooden sailing ships. For success, a good navigator was obliged to know what kind of temper certain areas of the ocean have. Knowledge went through difficult experience and risks, mistakes were expensive.
For example, the waters located between 50 ° and 60 ° south latitude, not far from the coast of Antarctica, received the unofficial name of the “Frantic Fifties” for their malevolence. Breath icy antarctica, cold hurricane winds, giant floating iceberg islands - all this threatened any ship that was within these latitudes.
The reason for these harsh names will become clear if you look at the map of the hemispheres of the Earth. Moving along these latitudes, you will not meet any large land masses - continents and even islands. (In American schools, this subpolar water area is usually called the Southern Ocean). The absence of obstacles that slow down and slow down the speed of the winds allows them to roam up to storm strength, acquiring special strength and danger and threatening sailors. Along the shores of the sixth continent - Antarctica - at 55 ° south latitude, the conditional southern boundary of this stream passes, and the northern one runs along the 40th parallel. At the junction of cold coastal waters from the ice-covered southern mainland and heated southern ocean margins, the strongest winds of the southern hemisphere are born.
No less ominously called the sailors sailing ships and the spaces enclosed between 40° and 50° south latitude - the "roaring forties".
Looking at the map of ocean currents, you can see that this zone is under the influence of two opposing water-air currents (currents): Westerly winds (cold) and South subtropical (warm). Their "interaction" causes the strongest instability in the atmosphere and, as a result, unexpected gusts of wind of storm strength and unpredictable direction. The latitudes along which the largest cold current flows have been assigned several extreme names.
The "roaring forties" surround the "howling" and "raging" fifties and the "piercing" sixties. The average wind speed in this area is 7-13 m/s. On the Beaufort scale, such a wind is called fresh and strong, and a storm and a strong storm (25 m / s) are a common thing. A powerful subpolar cold current, strong and constant westerly winds made these latitudes the shortest route for sailboats. Here lay the "clipper route", named after the type of ships valued for the fastest delivery of colonial goods from India and China to Europe. The famous "tea" clippers were installed in XVIII-XIX centuries speed records. Of course, if they managed to successfully go around the southern tip of Africa and South America, because for all the ships of that time it was a difficult test.
These dangers have not been forgotten for centuries and are reflected in art. At the end of 1967 the American rock band The The Doors released the Strange Days album. One of the compositions, which tells how sailors in the "horse" latitudes were forced to throw horses overboard, was called Horse Latitudes ("Horse latitudes"). What caused this and why did such a name arise?
The fact is that in the ocean waters located between 30 ° and 40 ° north latitude, the other extreme reigns - calm, calm. The absence of a single driving force for sailing ships heading from Europe to South America, forced them to stand idle for a long time waiting for the wind. Sometimes the air was so still that the ship could not move. A long lull in the atmosphere sometimes delayed sailors on their way for several weeks. Meanwhile, fresh water supplies were running low, and sailors were forced to throw overboard the dying horses that were being transported across the Atlantic from the Old to New World. And the sailors could only wait and hope that the god of the wind would have mercy and finally straighten the sails! Superstitious sailors claimed that the ghosts of horses appear at night in those latitudes. From here, apparently, the name came - "horse latitudes", or "horse thirties".
What explains this climatic feature?
It is known that the calm zones are located in both hemispheres between 30° and 35° latitude. These are areas of high pressure - huge subtropical anticyclones, which have amazing stability and encircle the entire globe. Thanks to this constancy, subtropical anticyclones even got their own names. In the Northern Hemisphere, this is the Azores anticyclone over the Atlantic Ocean and the Hawaiian anticyclone over the Pacific Ocean. In the Southern Hemisphere, the Mascarene anticyclone is located over the Indian Ocean, and the South Pacific is located over the Pacific. And over the South Atlantic Ocean lies the anticyclone of St. Helena, on which, by the way, he spent his last years life of Napoleon Bonaparte.
Why is this high pressure belt formed? The thing is that the equatorial and tropical regions receive the most solar radiation, so the air there is very warm. Becoming lighter when heated, warm air rushes upward, and in the upper troposphere spreads towards the subtropics. As the rising air cools and becomes heavy, it sinks into the subtropics. In this case, additional pressure is created on the earth's surface, i.e. an area of ​​high pressure occurs.
In anticyclones, the pressure changes little from the center to the periphery, so the winds here are also weak. In the central parts of the anticyclone, the weather is generally calm. It was this atmospheric passivity that delayed sailing ships for many weeks, dooming, thereby, living beings to death in the "horse latitudes" ...

Experience of non-scientific observations.

In the southern hemisphere, the forties mark oceanic expanses with steady winds that give rise to sea storms of such magnitude that since the first clippers trying to make regular flights, they have been called Roaring Forties - roaring forties. Shipwrecks, mysterious incidents and tragic stories in the literature are described in great abundance.

In the northern hemisphere, the fortieth latitudes encircle the globe mainly by land, but ...

Almost all, to varying degrees, preserved mountains and even the highest mountain ranges mark precisely these latitudes with their ridges. And everywhere in these latitudes of the northern hemisphere, even in the most inaccessible mountainous areas, people live.
People who consider themselves peoples, speak their own languages, but do not have statehood, have the status of nationalities inhabiting one or another region of this or that state, which in no way detracts from their role and significance in history and does not reduce their love of freedom.

I will give a few facts that can be considered as reference points of a certain geographical trend.

The rebellious tribes that once inhabited the mountainous regions of the present-day Chinese province of Henan, preserved in memory thanks to the martial arts of the Shaolin monks - 40 degrees north latitude.

The Uighurs, now inhabiting the Uighur Autonomous Region of China, but who once gave birth to the Horde, with all the known consequences of its transformations and conquests - 42 degrees north latitude.

The Caucasian peoples, the only ones who received statehood, albeit quite recently by the standards of history, among all these freedom-loving highlanders. The city of Grozny - 43 degrees north latitude.

Kurds living outside of time, but mostly in the Turkish space, with all their national ideas. Modern Kurdistan is from 34 to 40 degrees north latitude.

Basques, who do not leave hope for independence from Spain and self-determination of their Basque Country - 42 degrees north latitude.

The Gascons are practically the same Basques, although much more integrated into their French reality, but no less proud and freedom-loving, like their ancestor D'Artagnan. Gascony - 43 degrees north latitude.

And if we turn the globe, then it was at the fortieth latitudes that the conquest of America began and the sad story of the proud Indians from the Appalachians and the Cordillera, of whom today there are only one and a half million for their entire former country. The restored herd of recently almost completely exterminated bison may be more numerous, but the Indians are still fighting for their reservations!
The Bermuda Triangle, again, with one vertex pierces into the same fortieth latitudes ...

These are, it is not clear what, forties-fatal as a whole.
But in the northern hemisphere - a trend, however ...

None of those who worked in the twenties next to Komsomol member Pyotr Kapitsa in the foundry of the Leningrad Znamya Truda plant imagined that this smart and stubborn lad, who cast block heads for Fordson-Putilovets tractors, would later become a writer.

The young man was so enthusiastic about ensuring that there were no "grains" and "nightingales" in the casting, that it seemed that, apart from the forms and the flow of liquid, sparkling cast iron, nothing interested him. However, the young caster wrote poetry. Who didn't write them?

At the end of the twenties, Kapitsa was sent to study at the Engineering and Economic Institute.

In 1931, his story "The Rules of Spring" appeared on the pages of the Proletarian Avant-Garde magazine. The story attracted attention - in it the author touched upon the issues of love and morality that worried the Komsomol youth at that time.

The first meeting with the reader turned out to be decisive for the young author: in 1934 Kapitsa became a professional writer. First, he edits the oldest Komsomol magazine "Young Proletarian", then the magazine of the Leningrad pioneers - "Bonfire".

In 1938, Kapitsa's novel The Boxers appeared on the pages of the Literaturny Sovremennik magazine. This is a work about people. strong characters, about people of great courage. In their letters to the author, readers demanded a continuation of the novel. The demand is very tempting: to continue the life of the heroes is not the same as starting a thing anew - when continuing, the first book is the foundation of the second. And when there is a ready foundation, it is easier to build. Rarely anyone from contemporary writers not tempted. True, this temptation does not always lead to good results, sometimes unjustified chubby dilogies and trilogies appear. Kapitsa wrote the continuation of The Boxers only ten years after the release of the first book. The second book was published under the title When Fear Disappears, in which the heroes of the Boxers go through military trials.

Pyotr Kapitsa spent the war in the navy - first in the Baltic, and then in the Black Sea. At the end of 1943, Kapitsa's story "On the High Seas" began to be published in the newspaper of the Black Sea Fleet. The events and exploits of the heroes-sailors described in it were perceived by the reader as really existing. And this is natural: Pyotr Kapitsa is a writer who loves strong and courageous people. And the novel "Boxers", and the story "On the High Seas", and the stories "Hunters Go to Sea" are works about people of unbending will. Such are the heroes of the story "In the Days of Separation", and the book "They Stormed the Winter Palace". The story "Roaring Forties" is also about strong and courageous people.

The reader is already familiar with them from the book "In the Days of Separation". In the story "Roaring Forties" the writer continues the story about them.

Navigators call the "roaring forties" the fortieth latitudes of the southern hemisphere, where icy Antarctic charges meet with powerful scorching air currents of the tropics.

Roaring forties - a place more terrible than Biscay's "cemetery of ships". The roaring forties in Kapitsa's story are a symbol of the path that the heroes of the work, former boatmen of the navy: reserve officer Konstantin Shilyaev, signalman Semyachkin, radio operator Farafonov, gunnery Trefolev and boatswain Demchuk - overcome "in civilian life". And their "citizen" is whaling.

Until recently, the profession of whalers was considered the privilege of the proud descendants of the Vikings - the Norwegians. Yes, only they had access to the art of harpooners and cutters of whale carcasses. Thor Heyerdahl's compatriots still sail on almost all whaling ships in the world. Even the fishing fleets of such maritime nations as England, Japan, and Holland keep their whaling fleets on the payroll of Norwegians in gold salaries.

At first, Norwegian specialists also sailed on our ships, until the inquisitive and persistent Soviet sailors mastered the secrets of the skill of harpooners and dividers. Kapitsa convincingly shows how his heroes have to learn a new civilian profession right on the spot, in the most difficult conditions of the Antarctic, from a six-month stay in which, according to the testimony of the English navigator Captain Bennett, people go crazy. Soviet people, the heroes of the Roaring Forties, overcome the harsh conditions of navigation and master the art of whale hunting. Moreover, whaling brings them together, tempers their will. And as in the years of desperate battles with the Nazis, when the heroes of the story sailed on hunting boats, nicknamed the “Tulka fleet”, and for their courage “wooden battleships”, - and now they steadfastly overcome difficulties and come out victorious. But my task is not to retell the story, but to introduce the reader to its author.

The story "The Roaring Forties" is the undoubted success of Pyotr Kapitsa, who goes from book to book along his own path. Let's wish him a fair wind!

The days were getting shorter. Over gardens and fields floated, gleaming in the sun, cobwebs. From the gardens came the smells of Antonovka and Borovinka. The rowan trees were reddening, the birch trees were turning golden.

I wandered for hours along the quiet streets of my native town devastated by the war, sat for a long time on a cliff near the river, smoked and thought: how to live? Things to do?

More and more stars appeared in the sky. And the moon turned silver. Overhead, invisible flocks of birds flew by. The geese flew to the warm seas, calling to each other in the darkness, the cranes mournfully chirped. And involuntarily anxiety seized: “And I stay to spend the winter here. Something must be done." I couldn't imagine my life without the sea. When you sail for a long time on a ship, when the sea is in front of you at any moment, when you fall asleep and wake up under the measured splash of the waves, you involuntarily treat the sea as a living creature, as close friend, without which life seems incomplete, insipid and stuffy. It beckons you and pulls you to the sea. You even see it in a dream, hear the sound of the surf, feel the cold spray on your face and the powerful, invigorating breath of the sea.

“The war has long ended, the wounded hand has grown stronger. Pretty messing around! I finally said to myself. "It's time to get serious."

Let's go to Leningrad for a day, - I suggested to Lele. - You need to see a doctor.

What for? the wife shrugged. - I can answer all his stereotypical questions in advance: “Yes, I lived in besieged Leningrad ... I was afraid of bombings ... I was malnourished, I was close to dystrophy.” And I will predict in advance a stereotyped conclusion: “Weakening of the heart muscle. Complete rest, vitamins, glucose, enhanced nutrition. And I can not be approached with a common measure.

The fact is that before the war, Lelya was one of the most capable young athletes. She set a record time in the eight hundred meters. She was destined for a great future. But then the war broke out.

In this post-war summer, she tried to get into sports shape: she followed a strict regime, she trained a lot. And I was drawn into the Spartan life.

In September, Lelya performed at regional youth competitions. I came to watch her run.

After a pistol shot, Lelya immediately took the lead. She ran without any tension, with a light, sweeping step, moving further and further away from her rivals. Lelya raced in a circle, slightly throwing her head back. Her run was so swift and beautiful that I involuntarily admired it.-

And suddenly, having entered the second round, Lelya seemed to stumble, she staggered, pressed her left elbow to her side and continued to run with some kind of heavy step, as if her legs refused to obey her.

I saw how her face turned pale, how, slowing down, she tried to inhale air with her open mouth and could not ... I rushed to the treadmill and caught her on the go.

In my hands, Lelya somehow immediately went limp. Her legs gave way, she wanted to sink to the ground, but I did not let her either lie down or sit down, but led her across the field so that she would gradually catch her breath and calm down.