A ship modeler from Orsha spent two years crafting a ship and won a gold medal for it at a competition in Russia

Orsha resident Roman Knyrev, who represented the Vitebsk region as part of a team at the competition, brought a gold medal and a 1st degree diploma from the competition of scientific and technical creativity of students of the Union State "Talents of the XXI Century" from St. Petersburg.

More than 300 young researchers, innovators, astronomers, inventors, programmers from Belarus and Russia aged 14-17 presented their scientific developments and projects, ship, aviation, rocket and car models, replica models and working devices of various equipment, projects for interplanetary automatic stations and new space transport systems, simulators, training devices, computer software products, WEB-sites, multimedia animations and presentations, etc. to the jury. An indispensable condition of the competition: all participants had to pass the qualifying "sieve" in their regions on the eve of the final. The best of the best shared their latest achievements for several days in one of the most picturesque corners of the Karelian Isthmus – the "Zerkalny" camp, where, in addition to presentations and exhibitions, exciting master classes and meetings with famous scientists were held.

The radio-controlled border guard ship of project 205P, codenamed "Tarantul" MS-520, which took Roman almost 2 years to build, impressed the authoritative jury and, based on the results of all tests, surpassed its competitors in the "Technical Modeling" section. For the 14-year-old student of the sports club of the Center for Technical Creativity of Children and Youth of Orsha, this victory is by no means accidental. The talented young man's achievements include about 10 medals and diplomas as a winner and prize-winner of regional and republican competitions in ship modeling. His main mentor and inspirer is his father, Dmitry Knyrev, who also heads the club. A former student of the same Center, after serving in the army, he turned his hobby into a job and now brings all his best developments and ideas to life with his trainees. "I have been attending the club for 8 years and want to connect my future life with technology," says Roman. "I first participated in the 'Talents of the XXI Century' competition 2 years ago, but then I lacked the experience and knowledge of all the requirements to achieve victory. However, I took 4th place and eagerly awaited the next competition. During this time, under the guidance of the club leader, I brought a long-standing idea to life – I found old blueprints of the 'Tarantul' in the Center's archives, and gathered some information bit by bit from the Internet. I gladly rewatched all sorts of Soviet films featuring the border guard ship and started modeling. Moreover, I wanted to build not just a forward-moving vessel, but a radio-controlled one."

And the result exceeded all expectations – you look at it and see a miniature version of the real legendary "Tarantul" before you, which is also maneuverable and fast in action. Like any professional ship modeler, Roman has his own secrets. For example, to give the hull color a matte finish, the young technician added... tooth powder to the paint. And so that it wouldn't crack on polystyrene, he mixed it with dichloroethane. Roman documented all stages of modeling in a presentation, which played a significant role in summing up the competition results.

The result of his almost two-year work was presented by the young man in Belarus at the 13th Republican Spartakiad of Students in Technical Sports "TechnoSport", which took place in Minsk on Komsomolskoye Lake. From here, Roman Knyrev returned to Orsha not only as the absolute winner but also as a Candidate Master of Sports!

Olga Lebedeva, "Vitebskiye Vesti". Photo by the author.