4XXR+FJ Baranovka, Khmelnytskyi Oblast, Ukraine
The "Baranovka" point of the Struve Geodetic Arc is located in the village of Baranovka (Khmelnytskyi region, Yarmolyntsi district).
This is a geodetic mark—a triangle—that was part of a chain of such triangles stretching 2,820 kilometers. The geodetic mark itself, discovered in 2003, is located at a depth of one meter and twenty centimeters. It is a rock fragment with a notch and markings of precise coordinates—longitude and latitude. Finally, the point was arranged and a commemorative sign was placed on top.
The Struve Arc, once known as the "Russian" and later the "Russo-Scandinavian Meridian Arc," is one of UNESCO's World Heritage monuments. The arc consists of 265 triangulation points, along which measurements were conducted from 1816 to 1852, enabling the determination of the Earth's exact size and shape.
The reference points of this triangulation network were marked in various ways on the ground: hollows carved into rocks, iron crosses, stone pyramids, or specially installed obelisks. Often they were marked with sandstone bricks laid at the bottom of a pit; sometimes it was a granite cube with a cavity filled with lead, placed in a pit with cobblestones.
During the project to include the Struve Arc in the UNESCO list, which lasted eight years, special search and geodetic work was undertaken in each country to locate the original points. All information from all the countries of the Struve Arc was collected, structured, and standardized.
Not all of the original points were found during the special search and geodetic work carried out in recent years with active cooperation from scientists of the interested countries, and many of them were found to be heavily damaged. Therefore, only the best-preserved points—34 in total—were included in the World Heritage site.
In Ukraine, 4 such points out of 50 have been preserved.
– "Katerinovka," near the village of Katerinovka (Khmelnytskyi region) 49°33'57" N, 26°45'22" E (G)
– "Fel’shtin," near the village of Hvardiiske (Khmelnytskyi region) 49°19'48" N, 26°40'55" E
– "Baranovka," near the village of Baranovka (Khmelnytskyi region) 49°08'55" N, 26°59'30" E
– "Staro-Nekrasovka," near the village of Stara Nekrasovka (Odesa region), 45°19'54" N, 28°55'41" E
The work was completed in 2004. Each national package of final documents was signed by a government representative. At that time, a special International Committee was created, representing a supranational management mechanism for the Struve Arc.
The four points of the Struve Geodetic Arc located on the territory of Ukraine are included in the State Register of Immovable Monuments of Ukraine and are protected in accordance with the Law of Ukraine "On the Protection of Cultural Heritage."
Sources:
http://www.struve.by/index.php/en/ukraina/punkty-dugi-v-ukraine/142-punkt-felshtin
http://www.gototrip.com/publications/geodezicheskaya-duga-struve
