Good luck. See you

The host Alexander Belyaev died. He fought with cancer for many years - but continued to turn the weather forecast into fascinating stories

In Moscow on July 20, the leading weather forecast for NTV Alexander Belyaev died. He was 71 years old. For a long time he had an oncological disease - but despite this, he continued to work until 2018. Belyaev began to conduct a weather forecast for NTV in 1998, also in different years he conducted the program “Fight the Nation”, “Sunny. Without precipitation ”,“ ABC of the weather ”and others. "Medusa" recalls the history of the geographer, which accidentally fell on the screens - and has become one of the most beloved television agents of the whole country.

"Professor" Alexander Belyaev, whom the whole country knew from the weather forecast for NTV, was not at all a professor. A geographer-hydrologist, candidate of geographical sciences, deputy director at the Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences, he never taught or led young scientists, so he did not possess the professor’s status. The nickname, as Belyaev himself recalled, was invented by Leonid Parfenov, with whom the host worked together for NTV. “He invited me to the program“ Country and Peace ”, and there everyone had his nicknames. And he asked me: “Alexander Vadimovich, but what if we call you a professor?” I say: “You know, it's like being a lieutenant, to put on the marks of a major at a time.” Parfenova did not embarrass: “What is there, we want, we will make you an academician? Now there are a lot of all kinds of academics. So you will become them if you do not agree to the professor.” So I became them. Unfortunately, this has already gone beyond television, they call me everywhere a professor, ”Belyaev recalled in 2009 in an interview with the Interlocutor. Of course, I had to explain with colleagues at the institute because of this.

Belyaev’s early childhood was in the 1950s, he enthusiastically played soldiers, sculpted them from plasticine and arranged whole battles, and then read out by the Soviet historian Evgeny Tarle-to understand more about the course of battles, about military maps. Later he began to collect stamps (“There were no TVs, the brand became a window into the world”) - so he fell in love with geography. In 1972, he entered the geofac of Moscow State University. During student practice, he visited many countries - he brought pink oil from Bulgaria, and fur from Mongolia. Often recalls the trip to the Gobi desert, during which a certain scientist-zoologist found thanks to Belyaev an unknown species of Spider: “Now there is a sign in the Zoological Museum of New York on the exhibit:“ Gonofusia Belyaeviy. ” Named after the Russian geographer, ”the host said.

At Moscow State University, he was engaged in not only science, but also an amateur theater - and even starred in the mass of the film “Irony of Fate” (at the very beginning on the market where the hero of Shirvindt comes, he is a man in an orange jacket). “Every New Year, my relatives gather at the screen so as not to miss this microscopic moment,” Belyaev said. According to him , for shooting in the film, he received a quit of 9 rubles, but he did not cash him out - he retained in memory of his film career.

Geographer Belyaev hit television almost by accident. After graduating from the university with a degree in Sushi’s hydrology-the subject of his research was rivers, lakes and swamps-he worked on the distribution at the Institute of Soyudocnalproekt, and then, from the beginning of the 1970s-at the Institute of Geography of the Russian Academy of Sciences. There he became the founder of the Mercator studio, which makes a map for television and meteorological infographics. The Mercator for a long time was looking for three leading for the forecast for NTV, the third was still not there. Then Belyaev said : "That you are there for so long, let me spend." As a result, he conducted a forecast for more than 20 years - he combined with work at the institute, in the morning he was there, then he went to the Ostankino.

Once in the frame, Belyaev insisted that he would communicate with the viewer in the usual manner - like an old friend or neighbor, in a soft vest, without pressing ties and officials. But he could not watch his own broadcasts: “[it seemed that] it was not me. This is some kind of unpleasant creature for me who wants to like, who smiles all the time, which says pleasant things that people like. I’m not at all the same as I’m trying to appear on the screen. ”

Nevertheless, the whole country fell in love with him, he became the main leading weather in Russia. The first time he left the air in 2017 - to undergo treatment at the Blokhin Oncology Center. He had lung cancer in 2011, but until 2017 he did not talk about this to the general public. Belyaev’s disease developed against the background of diabetes, as he himself said in an interview with Andrei Malakhov. Having passed chemotherapy and two operations, he returned to the screens in February 2018. “He fought and took the air. Sometimes, in order to record it, it took several hours, because after each short recording he went to bed and rested. The audience was not visible, but we saw it, ” recalls the president of Meteo-TV, Alexander Mitroshenkov. Belyaev himself admitted that after each working day he came to his senses for a couple of days. But he could not abandon work, because she helped "get out of the depression with her health." “There is no bad weather, there is poor health. [If you feel bad,] contact doctors immediately. It's not about the weather, but the matter is about you, ”he said in the same interview.

In 2017, Belyaeva’s wife, artist Nina Belyaeva, died from oncological disease. They met in childhood in the country, Nina was the daughter of the director of the sanatorium 200 meters from the village of Maksimovka, where they grew Belyaev. We got married in 1973, Nina put on a wedding not a white, but a red dress. They celebrated loudly - "there was not a single photo left." Together they lived for more than 50 years. “There are no such people and will not be. She always said the truth-uterus. [...] It would be nice to leave together, but since God is so written that we must continue to live, then we must live, ”he said in an interview with 2018. The son of Belyaevs, Ilya Belyaev, is also a geographer, he is preparing for the release of the card, which are shown in NTV programs.

In the news story that came out in memory of Alexander Belyaev, colleagues with NTV recall him almost with tears: “It is difficult to imagine what it was worth Alexander Vadimovich to stay in the frame, for many years he was treated with severe cancer.” “Without it, we are some completely disadvantaged,” says Irina Polyakova, presenter of the weather forecast for NTV.

For the viewer, Belyaev’s forecasts have always been not only about the weather: “I want, looking at me, the viewer smile, relax, take off the load of the last day. It is important for me not to leave the viewer in a sense of hopelessness. I seem to say to him: “There is no need to be upset, life continues, in the end everything will be fine.” And if he smiles after my final replica: “See you,” I will assume that I played a role well. ”

Natalia Gredina