It was Sunday morning at 8.30 a.m. and a glowing stream of pig iron began to roll under the blast furnace No. 1 at the Vítkovice Ironworks, accompanied by a sizzle of hot sparks as it had so many times before. A blast was taking place under the furnace. This time, however, it was different, it was watched by 1,200 employees, it was 27 September 1998 and this blast was the last ever in Vítkovice.
The earth turned on its axis like any other day, the world remained the same, but on that day a new history of the city began to be made in Ostrava. Our story began in 1828, when Vítkovice Ironworks was founded, at that time still as a puddling furnace. The first blast furnace for coke was built here in the 1830s and processed coal mined on the premises. Gradually, a large metallurgical complex was established, producing not only iron but also steel structures, steam engines and armor for warships, which was taken over by the state after the Second World War.
After 1989, Vítkovice was transformed into a joint-stock company, but it remained in the hands of the state. The first changes came as early as the end of 1993, when a decision was made on the new structure of the company and the form of privatization. This was decided by the government only in September 1996, with the aim of making it different and better than in the case of other industrial giants. However, it was clear even then that structural changes would be made. This was definitely confirmed by Government Resolution in 1996, which decided to stop production at the agglomeration, the blast furnaces and the coke plant by the end of 1998.
Production in Vítkovice was therefore by this time already concentrated in the field of power, transport and chemical engineering and the production of heavy plates, in which over CZK 2.5 billion was invested. For the supply of pig iron, a joint blast furnace plant "Vysoké pece Ostrava" was established in Kunčice on 1 January 1997 in cooperation with Nová hut company, which started supplying pig iron to Vítkovice at the end of July.
The first signal was the last blast on blast furnace number 4, which took place on 29 July 1998. The furnace stopped being loaded with raw materials and the smelters drilled the blast hole in the presence of the company management and cameras. The iron then flowed, as it had so many times before, into a mobile mixer, which bore a brief but telling inscription: ”29 July 1998 - THE LAST IRON from the VÍTKOVICE, 4TH BLAST FURNACE”.
But the blast furnace No. 4 was not the only one. It was preceded by the closure of surrounding operations. Already on 21 May, the last train with ore for the agglomeration set off from the transfer station in Čierna nad Tisou (Slovakia). The train was welcomed in the evening in Vítkovice and the next day, in the presence of journalists, the ore was tipped out of the carriage, with which the employees said goodbye with the inscription: "IT'S ALREADY HERE, LADS. THE LAST CARRIAGE IS BEING TIPPED TODAY, 22 MAY 1998". On July 8, the bricklayers again said goodbye to the last “Veronica” - the pig iron wagon. They decorated the Veronica for the day with flowers, the words "990 pieces" to signify the nearly 1,000 wagons they have bricked since 1959, and the words "REMEMBER THE MASONS."
Other plants followed, on 28 July at 6 p.m. the belt in the agglomeration finally stopped after 37 years of operation, and a few days after the last blast furnace No. 4, on 5 August, the coke plant, at that time the oldest in Czechia, was also shut down by displacing coke at Battery 5.
Two months later, on 27 September 1998, the scene under the blast furnace repeated itself and Vítkovice gave the world its last carriages of iron after 162 years and 90.1 million tonnes of production. The last blast took place symbolically at the oldest of the three Vítkovice blast furnaces - furnace No. 1. For the last time, the chutes were filled with pig iron and the furnace began to blow out to the accompaniment of a loud noise. The next day, the furnace was shut off from the gas network, the manholes were broken through and the furnace was flooded with water.
This festive event was marred only a day later by an ecological accident when cyanide from blast furnace gas leaked into the Ostravice and Odra rivers, the high values of which exceeded the normal values for blowing and thus the possibilities of wastewater treatment in the gas treatment plant. The ironworks have thus definitively convinced the public of the correctness of the steps taken in recent days.
The closure was also a blow to the residents of Ostrava. At that time, Vítkovice employed 16,000 people, including over 1,200 in iron production alone. Preparation for this move therefore took more than two years, many employees found new jobs within the company, others in the new plant in Kunčice, and thanks to cooperation with the Ostrava Labour Office, retraining was also underway to enable completely new employment. A Social Fund was also created to help former and current employees in difficult situations.
However, the city itself felt relieved. Over the 170 years of Vítkovice's existence, production had become so intertwined with the town that the blast furnaces were only a kilometer from the center itself. Carbon monoxide emissions dropped from 32,000 tonnes to 1.9 tonnes per year immediately after production ceased, dust emissions were reduced, and the amount of wastewater and industrial waste was also reduced - over 276,000 tonnes of blast furnace slag alone was produced each year.
The furnaces burned out, the chimneys stopped smoking, people left, but the ironworks remained in the town. Many questions began to arise, but also fears about what would happen to the symbol of Ostrava...
Introduction photo: Vítkovice Magazin. 13. 8. 1998
Last photo: Illustrative. Photographs of Třinec Ironworks, by Anna Šmehilová
The article was written within the project: https://sincere-project.eu/
Anyone who has traveled through the Czech countryside knows them – tall dark blue cylinders rising high, displaying the iconic logo of the Vítkovice Ironworks, clearly announcing a place associated with agriculture. These are the enameled tower silos and tanks known as "Vítkovice" — symbols of agricultural industry of our countryside.
