Miretskii, Vitold

Miretskii, Vitol’d Kaetanovich 

Born 1843, in Vitebsk Province; died Oct. 31 (Nov. 13), 1901, in Warsaw. Russian metallurgist.

Miretskii graduated from the Mining Engineer Corps Institute in St. Petersburg in 1861 and then worked at the Zlatoust Plant. In 1863 he was appointed assistant director for technical matters at the Perm’ Steel Works. In 1870 he was appointed director of the Katav Metallurgical Plants in the Urals and combined them with the luriuzan’ plants into a large production complex with six blast furnaces.

Miretskii was one of the first in the Urals to introduce a hot blast in blast furnaces and to construct air-heating apparatus. He demonstrated the possibility and advantageousness of puddling pig iron smelted by hot blasting. Reorganization of the plants (1877–79) and the construction of Bessemer and rail-rolling mills were undertaken on Miretskii’s initiative.

WORKS

“Vozdukhonagrevatel’nyi apparat v luriuzanskom zavode i neskol’ko slov po povodu stat’i g. Time ob otstalosti nashikh zheleznykh zavodov.” Gornyi zhurnal, 1878, vol. 3, nos. 8–9.
“Po povodu soobshcheniia g. Chernova ob Ural’skikh zavodakh.” Gornyi zhurnal, 1881, vol. 2, no. 6.

REFERENCE

Zhukovskii, S. “Vitol’d Kaetanovich Miretskii” [obituary]. Gornyi zhurnal, 1901, vol. 4, no. 11.

N. K. LAMAN