Mikhail Mikhailovich Pomortsev

Born July 12 (24), 1851, in the village of Vasil’evshchina, Novgorod Province; died June 19 (July 2), 1916, in Petrograd. Russian aerologist.

Pomortsev graduated from the Mikhail Artillery Institute in St. Petersburg in 1871 and the Academy of the General Staff in 1878. He taught at the Military Engineering Academy from 1881 and at an artillery school, an aeronautics school, and the Military Medical Academy at St. Petersburg from 1885. In 1885 he organized aerostat ascents to study atmospheric phenomena. Results from dozens of such ascents were processed by Pomortsev. In 1889 he published Survey of Weather Prediction Science, the first Russian textbook on synoptic meteorology. Pomortsev also invented several instruments for aerial navigation and other purposes.