“Well, punch. Come on, don't die "

The Victory Parade in Yekaterinburg gathered thousands of spectators. Only the elect were allowed into the safe zone

By June 24, Yekaterinburg approached the only Ural cities that did not abandon the Victory Parade. Coronavirus cases are registered here more than in neighboring Perm, Chelyabinsk, Kurgan, Ufa and Tyumen, but the status of the “capital of the Urals” apparently obliges “not a step back”.

Whether they would let the audience a parade, it was not known to the last. But on June 23, Vice Governor Pavel Krekov announced: they will be allowed.

“We will not make special restrictions. We advise you to distance ourselves from each other and watch the parade remotely, ”he said. At the same time, he added: I would not want to say at a briefing later that there was an increase in incidence.

Those who nevertheless come to the parade promised maximum safety measures: a social distance, temperature measurement when passing through a checkpoint, breeding people's flows.

And then the day of X.

"Veterans" of strange fronts

From different sides to the main city artery, Lenin Street, people are being pulled out: groups of three or four people, families, one at a time. All ages. And thirty meters from the area of ​​the metal fences they are slowed down by the police: “You can’t continue. Present a pass. "

“What is the pass? Where did you need to get a pass? " - It is heard that and then.

An elderly man in camouflage and with a poster of the “Immortal Regiment” is trying to go ahead. He is slowed down.

- My father came from Leningrad to Koenigsberg, my mother survived the blockade. I passed Afghan. What kind of pass do you need? He shouts to the policeman.

It became known about the checkpoint on the eve of the evening. True, information about him did not scatter as widely as the words of the vice-governor of Krekov that "there will be no special restrictions." Several media reported that they would allow veterans of military service and military operations to the parade - they say they will help to take away the Ministry of Public Security. But for Afghan Vladimir Korshin there was no place among the audience.

“For me to come to the parade is a sacred duty,” he says, leaving the police. - My dad, Alexey Alexandrovich, at the age of 17 went to the front as a volunteer. Leningrad, Vilnius, Kaunas passed. Every year I go to the parade and wear its portrait. And now, too, I could not help but come.

- Are you not afraid of epidemics? I ask.

- After the war in Afghanistan, nothing is scared.

With Vladimir Korshin - I see. But what kind of war did actor Sergei Bezrukov and billionaire Igor Altushkin go through the war. But they got to the parade.

With me, two well -groomed women of about thirty are presented to me.

- Where did you get them? - I ask.

“At work,” one drops dryly. And he hurries out for the fence.

Yes, war veterans in 2020 have changed noticeably.

A pandemic crowd

Those who were lucky enough to go for the fence fall into the “maximum security zone” by Vice-Governor Krekov. Sanctors meet them behind the police - they measure the temperature. Masks, gloves and pass to the rostrum.

The rest are pushing, trying to take a place in metal structures. Quarantine, social distance? For what? Half of those who came even do not have masks.

- Skip, miss! - The guy and the girl are busily making his way through the crowd in the front rows. Suddenly they meet a rebuff: a stocky man who has already taken a convenient position does not want to miss them. After a five -second skirmish, the couple unfolds and tries to break through on the other side.

The company of students shoots what is happening in the video.

- Is it not scary to stand in such a crowd during the pandemic period? - I ask them.

“There will be nothing to us,” the student retorts. - This virus, they say, only kills the elderly. And we ... well, punch. Go, do not die ( laugh ).

- Are you not afraid to infect your relatives? - I already feel like a bore.

- We are visitors, we have no one here.

The guys came to the parade, "to pay tribute to the memory" and because "there is at least some movement here." “I got tired of sitting at home back in April,” says one.

A middle -aged woman is outraged by the organization.

- They promised us that they would let everyone in the social distance of one and a half meters, that there would be protective equipment. And here - look - the crowd. And no control.

- Why don't you leave?

“This is still a holy holiday,” reproach appears in her voice.

- And then, look: even the sidewalk is blocked. If people were given people along the whole street to stand, a social distance would have turned out. After all, a little is needed.

I go around other gearboxes-the picture is the same: somewhere in the fences-dozens, somewhere-hundreds of people. Close, climb into the poles and raise each other on the shoulders. Of the safety measures - only masks on their faces, and even then not everyone.

The parade is opened by Colonel General Alexander Lapin, commander of the troops of the Central Military District. He talks about the war, about memory and that no one can threaten our shrines.

After two weeks, it will become known whether Koronavirus is able to threaten the shrines.

PS

According to the Ural media reports, all comers were nevertheless admitted to one of the checkpoints in the “security zone”. Judging by the photographs, she stopped being safe after that.