Geophysical Observatory

a scientific research institution that is concerned with the study of individual geophysical problems. The first geophysical observatories were established at Ekaterinburg (Sverdlovsk) in 1836 and Tbilisi in 1837 as magnetic and meteorological observatories for the mining industry. In 1884 another one was organized at Irkutsk, and in 1912 another at Vladivostok. In 1849 the Central Geophysical Observatory was founded at St. Petersburg; along with a broad program of geophysical studies, it exercised systematic scientific and methodological guidance over the observatories and meteorological stations. During Soviet rule, geophysical observatories have been established at Kiev, Minsk, Odessa, Kuibyshev, Tashkent, Alma-Ata, and other locations.

In view of the increasing demands of the national economy, the direction of work on terrestrial magnetism was entrusted in 1940 to the newly created Institute of Terrestrial Magnetism (now the Institute of Terrestrial Magnetism, the Ionosphere, and Radio Wave Propagation of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR), which supervises the special magnetic and ionospheric observatories and stations. The geophysical observatories, which were under the control of the Central Administration of the Hydrometeorological Service, have been reorganized into hydrometeorological observatories.