Cooperation between the city and the military allowed the port city’s famed beaches to reopen this summer for the first time since the full-scale Russian invasion.
Yulia Klimenko visited Odesa in 2021 and again in late August this year, when she and her daughter came from their home in Dnipro for a holiday. The difference was dramatic.
“Compared to past seasons, Odesa was deserted,” she says, recalling the scanty crowds on Derybasivska Street, before the war typically thronged with people around the clock. This year she was able to snap photos of the city without people filling the scene.
“But at the Lanzheron and Arkadia beaches, everything looked like peacetime,” she says. “A real resort! I understand that many Odesa residents have evacuated, and tourists are afraid to travel while the shelling of the port goes on. But we are not afraid!”
Danger From the Sea
The State Agency for Tourism Development of Ukraine reported that tourist tax revenues in Odesa fell by 80% in 2022, the year of Russia’s invasion. In 2021, the year before the war, the tourist tax – paid by hotel guests – contributed 26.8 million hryvnias ($735,000) to the city budget. That placed Odesa oblast (region) second nationwide, after the city of Kyiv, as a generator of the tax. The figure fell to just 5.4 million hryvnias last year.
And these figures do not reflect the full extent of the damage to the local economy. Besides the direct losses from the tourist tax, there are also indirect ones from the reduced number of visitors and lower hotel occupancy. Tourism agency figures for the first half of 2023 show the number of people engaged in the tourism business down by a third compared to 2021.
For the Odesa oblast, with some 300 kilometers of coastline and a heavy reliance on tourism, the cost has been enormous.
“Our main competitive advantage is the sea. The swimming pool doesn’t mean as much as the sea,” said Ilona Remyhaylo, the manager of the Palace Del Mar Hotel, a high-priced resort near the beach in Odesa’s tourist district.
The beaches of Odesa – major attractions for city dwellers and visitors – were closed after Russia invaded Ukraine on 24 February 2022. The Black Sea was effectively sealed off. In the first days of the war, Odesa residents either stayed indoors or fled to safer areas. There was a high risk that enemy forces would reach and occupy the city.
When the situation stabilized, people gradually returned to the city and its beaches, only to be greeted by barbed wire and red signs warning, “Beware of mines!”
The mines that then and now pose a danger on the local beaches are of two kinds.
Ukraine’s military quickly laid mines at places on the coast where a Russian landing seemed possible. Because of the terrain, this could only be done on the eastern part of the Odesa coast. No one has been allowed near those areas, and it is unlikely that access will be opened before the end of the war.
The other kind of mine threat comes from sea mines placed by the Russians that later broke free and drifted, with some heading toward the coast.
The tourism industry in the oblast was severely affected by the closure of the seaside recreation centers. Many resort towns faced greater challenges than Odesa, which had other sources of income and attractions besides the beaches. Odesa also hosted many foreigners, such as journalists and staff of international organizations, who came to work on the recovery of the south of the country. Large hotels were able to operate, but small recreation centers or houses that were rented out struggled to find business. Some smaller hotels with swimming pools, previously for the use of guests only, began inviting the public to swim for a moderate fee. Others began to provide housing for people displaced from areas under fierce attack by Russian ground and air forces.
The coastal zone itself often became the target of enemy attacks, including the resort towns of Zatoka and Karolino-Bugaz. Some 20 kilometers up the coast, Odesa was not so badly affected, and the revival of the tourism industry began there.
“For us it was quite risky to open our hotel, because it’s a holiday destination, just like most hotels in Odesa. When we reopened our doors in May and June [2023], we were taking certain risks,” Remyhaylo said.
Risk of death or injury in a Russian attack is something Odesans, like most of Ukraine, have had to deal with for the better part of two years. Just this month, at least eight people were injured and the city’s art museum damaged by Russian missile and drone strikes on 5 November. Three days later a Russian missile killed a civilian ship’s crew member in the port, Ukrainian officials said.
Floating Security Fences
City authorities initially hoped to open the beaches at the beginning of the 2023 summer season, but the destruction of the Kakhovka dam in June forced a delay.
“Despite fears, the bathing season opened in Odesa at the end of the summer. We saw that it brought benefits,” said Roman Hrygoryshyn, then the deputy head of Odesa’s regional military administration, who helped formulate the plans to make the beaches safe for swimming.
“We worked with the beach [business] tenants, and the tourist facility owners to ensure safe and enjoyable places for visitors,” Hrygoryshyn, who before the war worked at the oblast’s tourism authority, told a press conference.
Ukraine has been under martial law since the Russian invasion, and any plan to protect the beaches rested on full cooperation from the military. The keystones of the plan worked out by local authorities and the army were to send divers to inspect the sea floor and remove any hazards, and to erect nets to stop floating sea mines.
Yulia Klimenko and her daughter could not have taken their beach vacation before 7 August, when local authorities announced the successful reopening of parts of the Black Sea coast within the Odesa city limits.
Work to make the beaches safe for visitors took more than year.
“We surveyed the territory and decided which beaches people could be allowed on, so people would have decent conditions for a safe time,” Oleh Kiper, the governor of Odesa Oblast, said in August on the national news and Telegram.
Back to the Beach
This summer, six Odesa beaches reopened, although with significant limitations compared to before the invasion. Boat trips, once a favorite pastime, were prohibited. People were not allowed on the beaches during air raid alerts or during storms.
Odesa authorities fenced off the areas designated as safe for swimming with ordinary fishing nets. During the summer season, lifeguards patrolled the beaches on the lookout for floating mines. A smaller crew is monitoring the beaches this winter.
“[Air raid] shelters are nearby; we have nets for the mines, and the capability to disperse crowds” in a dangerous situation, Kiper said.
“Our goal is for there to be affordable recreation facilities along the entire coastline wherever possible. And for entrepreneurs who work in the field of tourism, this is an opportunity to support themselves and the economy of our country,” the governor added, back in August.
The project’s most visible safety feature are the lines of fishing nets offshore to stop any drifting Russian sea mines. But the risk that mines could float to unfenced stretches of the coast remains.
“We can’t count how many drifting mines there are in the sea, or know where they are. Their movement is not at all predictable, so we faced new challenges,” says Serhiy Chutkyi, head of mine risk management at the Ukrainian Deminers Association. The association represents deminers, helps rehabilitate those injured in the line of duty, and advocates for public control of demining in Ukraine. The group acts as a consultant on the Odesa beach security project.
There were other fears for the safety of beach-goers. So far, though, concerns that pollutants released by the Kakhovka dam explosion might reach as far as Odesa have not been realized. Environmental services monitor the water quality and so far, no raised levels have been recorded.
Mines remain the main danger. Divers check the sea bottom off the beaches designated for swimming, although poor visibility can hamper their work. Everything depends on the state of the coastline.
No beach can reopen to the public without an “underwater passport” issued by the Odesa mayor’s office after divers have inspected the sea bottom and removed any potentially dangerous objects.
“Can we be confident that these checks provide a 100% guarantee of safety? Of course not,” Chutkyi says. “Even if the coastline is checked, small mines can still turn up. They can be covered with sand; they can be moved by water currents.”
Risk Reduced, Not Eliminated
The biggest sign that Odesa’s beach safety project is working, the demining association says, is that no one was injured on the beach in this year’s short tourist season (August and September). But the public should not be complacent, the deminers warn. Sea mines come in different varieties. Some get stuck on the sea bottom and remain active. Others have a self-destruct mechanism that sets them off after a certain time.
Signaling the continuing danger, a ship loaded with wheat was damaged in the Black Sea on 17 November in an incident Ukrainian authorities blamed on a floating sea mine. Some 40 sea mines – whether Russian or Ukrainian is difficult to say, as both countries use similar models – have been destroyed by Ukraine’s neighboring countries since the war began, The Maritime Executive wrote in March. Mines damaged beachfront buildings in Sychavka, a village just a short drive east of Odesa, in March and again in June this year.
Local self-government bodies and law enforcement cannot stop everyone from visiting unsecured beaches, as individuals can take their chances and decide to ignore the warnings. At the same time, despite the risks, there is an understanding that people need places to relax, private entrepreneurs need to make money, and Odesa’s economy relies heavily on tourism.
Despite the first steps, it is too early to talk about the full restoration of resort life. The recreation sector depends not only on beaches. The tourism and hospitality sectors have been particularly hit by the midnight to 5 a.m. curfew, which forces many bars and restaurants to close early, and many tourist excursions have been cut back. However, even part-time employment helps businesses survive in difficult times, pay taxes, and provide jobs. The work is carried out with a view to the future. It is easier to adjust an already operating business than to build it from scratch.
Hanging over all the plans and hopes is the reality that it is impossible to make firm plans while the war rages on.
“Next summer, we plan to open more than the six beaches we had this year. However, everything will depend on the security situation and how events will unfold,” Hrygoryshyn, the former deputy head of Odesa’s regional military administration, told journalists earlier this year.
“It is hard to make predictions for next summer, but we will make all the necessary preparations in advance,” he said. “We learned a lot from the experience we gained in the last month of summer, and we hope to use it for everyone’s benefit.”
…
Odesa-based journalist Mariia Shevchuk has reported for several regional and national Ukrainian media outlets. Since February 2022 her focus has been on the war’s effects on the civilian population.
