Swathes of Moscow are without water and electricity today following a fire at Chagino power plant. Blogger Two-Zero is fortunate enough to be in an area where the power is still up, and he’s posted his observations:
This morning power total blacked out right in rush hour. It’s not as bad as in New York (Summer 2003 – I have been there and enjoyed the adventure), but it’s a pretty serious situation. Metro’s don’t run. People need to get evacuated from stuck metros (subways) and elevators. Traffic is a pure chaos… Hospitals are operating on emergency power.
President Putin has decisively laid the blame at the feet of Unified Energy System, Russia’s power monopoly.
Update: And here’s the view from News From Moscow (the Mosnews blog):
Today some of MosNews.com team members had to walk about 6 kilometers to the office because many metro stations were closed. Some people spent two hours in the stopped train inder the ground - and we wish you never learned what is Moscow underground while it’s 30 degrees in the street.
We remember Russians laughed at America’s blackout… Well, today America can laugh at us.
Lyndon has been also been following the blackout, with a plethora of posts at Scraps of Moscow, including his reaction to the news that UES, run by Anatoly Chubais, has taken the blame:
No doubt the professional pundits will be all over this by the time tomorrow morning’s Moscow Times op-ed page goes to press, but I have to wonder when one of these stories about blaming Chubais will mention what an easy political target he is, due to his extreme unpopularity with the Russian electorate.
Update 2: Ex-Moscow resident Tim Worstall, has begun to wonder about conspiracy theories:
Would the siloviki blow up a sub station to get at Chubais? There are those who insist they blew up blocks of flats , killing hundreds, to get the second Chechen War going. How the rumours will be flying today.
- What next?
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