A devastating wave of wildfires across Russia could ravage millions of hectares of forests and cause worse damage than last year’s catastrophic blazes, environmentalists and officials said Thursday. “We’re burning, burning badly,” said Greenpeace’s forestry expert Alexei Yaroshenko. “This year’s situation is already much worse than last year’s.” In 2010, an unprecedented heat wave triggered fires that killed 55 people, destroyed thousands [...]
Tag: Heat wave
June 10, 2011
May 28, 2011
Deadly Wildfires Continue To Burn In Russia
Russian authorities say that deadly wildfires have burned nearly 7,000 hectares as hot, dry weather kindles fears less than a year after peat-bog and forest fires devastated the country, RFE/RL’s Russian Service reports. More than 118 fires were said to be burning on May 28, with around 150 already extinguished. Sixty-two deaths have been blamed [...]
May 28, 2011
Fears Mount That Russia Could Face Another Summer Of Deadly Forest Fires
MOSCOW — As raging wildfires continue in Russia’s Far East, fears are mounting that the country could face out-of-control blazes for the second summer in a row. The Emergency Ministry said at one point last week that 421 peat and forest fires had burst out in a 24-hour period in Siberia and in the Urals [...]
May 28, 2011
Deadly Wildfires Continue To Spread In Russia
Russian authorities say that deadly wildfires have spread to cover nearly 7,000 hectares as hot, dry weather kindles fears less than a year after peat-bog and forest fires devastated central Russia, RFE/RL’s Russian Service reports. More than 118 fires are said to be burning, with around 150 already extinguished. Sixty-two deaths have been blamed on [...]
May 8, 2011
Firefighters battle raging wildfires in Siberia
Firefighters are battling 34 wildfires in Siberia on an area of over 1,300 hectares, Russia’s Emergencies Ministry said on Sunday. Over the last twenty-four hours, the area affected by the wildfires has increased by 838 hectares. The human factor is considered as the main cause for the emergence of forest fires, the ministry said. The [...]
May 1, 2011
Firefighters battle 10 wildfires in Russian Far East
Firefighters have extinguished over 20 wildfires that have emerged in the Russian Far East in the past twenty-four hours and are still battling ten forest fires in the area, Russia’s Emergencies Ministry said on Sunday. “Over the past twenty-four hours, 31 wildfires have been registered in the Far Eastern Federal District on a total area [...]
April 30, 2011
April 28, 2011
Russian Press at a Glance, Thursday, April 28, 2011
POLITICS Russian Prosecutor General Yury Chaika vigorously defended his record on Wednesday as his tenure nears an end amid a turf war that has engulfed his own son (Moscow Times, Moskovskiye Novosti) The Kremlin has dropped prominent adviser Gleb Pavlovsky over his publicly stated preference for President Dmitry Medvedev in next year’s presidential election, highlighting [...]
April 26, 2011
April 21, 2011
Work days and weekends affect global climate
Over the past year alone Moscow was affected by different climate anomalies – last summer’s two-month heat wave, winter’s ice rain and recent April snow. Is it a tendency? If so, what may be next? Nikolai Yelansky, head of the trace gas laboratory at the A.M. Obukhov Institute of Atmospheric Physics of the Russian Academy [...]
April 20, 2011
April 19, 2011
April 17, 2011
Russia’s emergencies ministry extinguishes 10 wildfires in Russian Far East
Rescuers have extinguished ten wildfires on an area of 799 hectares in the Russian Far East over the past 24 hours, the press office of the Emergencies Ministry said on Sunday. “Al the ten wildfires on a total area of 799.3 hectares have been extinguished. They raged in two regions in the south of the [...]
April 14, 2011
Beating the heat leaves scars on Moscow’s face
Moscow’s architectural heritage has been beset by the twin giants of rapacious developers and obliging officials. But now the face of the city is threatened by a smaller, yet bigger, menace. The crackling drooling metal boxes of air conditioners became the ultimate symbol of the New Order in Moscow – almost like teenagers with acne [...]