December 27, 2005, 18:58 Society

Muscovites will be killed by killer elevators

Mike Gabrielyan Russians are threatened by fires, floods, earthquakes, bird flu, and residents of Moscow and St. Petersburg are also threatened by falling elevators. Helicopters will crash more often, residential buildings will collapse, trains will crash, and cars will get into accidents. All this, according to the forecasts of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, will happen in Russia in 2006.

On Tuesday, the head of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, Sergei Shoigu, summed up the work of rescuers over the past year and told what awaits Russians in the future. According to him, in general, 2005 turned out to be calmer than the previous two. Over the 11 months of 2005, more than 2 thousand 300 emergencies occurred in Russia, including more than 2 thousand man-made and about 200 natural, as well as 10 major terrorist attacks.

The number of natural disasters over the 11 months of 2005 decreased by one and a half times compared to the long-term average.

The number of deaths from natural emergencies decreased by 3.2 times compared to the long-term average: 38 people died. There were more forest fires, their total area increased by 20% compared to 2004, amounting to about 60% of the long-term average values. But the outgoing year turned out to be gentle in terms of the number of floods.

The number of man-made emergencies in 2005 remained at the level of the previous year, but this is still one and a half times lower than the norm. About 1,200 people died in such accidents.

In 2005, according to Shoigu, Russian Emergency Situations Ministry specialists saved 90 thousand people and provided assistance to 1.5 million. However, during the year, a total of 4,940 people died in emergency situations, including 122 children. Another 25 thousand people became victims of fires in apartments and businesses.

As for 2006, it threatens the Russians with both fire and water.

“The forecast for forest fires is disappointing,” Shoigu stated. True, even before the time of fires comes, Russia will be thoroughly flooded. “It’s a very snowy winter in Yakutia, since the end of November the Ministry of Emergency Situations has been alarmed about floods on the Lena,” Shoigu said. The snow will bring problems even before it melts: an increased risk of avalanches is predicted in Kamchatka, Sakhalin, Transbaikalia and the Caucasus. “As life shows, our forecasts, unfortunately, come true,” said the head of the Ministry of Emergency Situations.

In addition, Russia is facing earthquakes.

According to the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the forecast for an unfavorable seismological situation in the Far East remains: in the south of the Kamchatka Peninsula, the north and south of the Kuril Islands, in the areas of the Commander Islands and Sakhalin Island. “We confirm the forecast for next year, we are not canceling our readiness and are waiting with great anxiety - God forbid, something happens,” the minister said, noting, however, that the necessary measures to reduce the consequences of a possible natural disaster in the Far East, including the creation supplies of medicines, blood, training of equipment and rescuers have already been taken.

Storms and tornadoes are expected in the Southern, Central, Volga and Northwestern federal districts. Rescuers are warning residents of the Siberian, Ural and Southern federal districts of impending floods due to the poor condition of most dams.

There will also be plenty of man-made emergencies in 2006.

In the city of Tolyatti, Samara Region, the threat of collapse of residential buildings will increase sharply.

In total, 309 houses with a residential area of 1.2 million square meters may collapse in Russia. m, half of them are multi-storey. An increased danger will also come from elevators: as rescuers say, in a number of regions in 2006 the proportion of elevators that have exceeded their service life will exceed 30%. The elevators of St. Petersburg, Moscow and the Moscow region are especially terrible: it’s time to replace almost half of them.

Even more Russian residents, according to the forecast of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, will die in road accidents. The Ministry of Emergency Situations already calls car accidents “the biggest headache.” “Every seventh person cannot do without rescuers,” said the head of the department. During the day, EMERCOM employees take approximately 60 wounded motorists away from mangled cars in helicopters.

In addition, according to the forecasts of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the number of accidents on railways will increase, in particular when transporting dangerous goods. The reason is the unsatisfactory condition of the access railway tracks to potentially dangerous enterprises. According to the head of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, the reason for such a forecast is “the deterioration of access roads and railway equipment.”

Speaking about air transport, Shoigu noted that in 2006 “an increase in accident rates is not expected.” True, as it turned out, only planes will not fall more often. Helicopters will start to get into accidents much more often.

The largest number of incidents is predicted to occur on Mi-8, Mi-2 helicopters and An-2 aircraft owned by private airlines.

Numerous fires await the Russians. A special category of man-made emergencies are fires in government buildings and residential buildings. The buildings that will burn the most will be in the Primorsky and Krasnoyarsk Territories, the Moscow, Sverdlovsk, Kemerovo and Irkutsk Regions, the Altai, Krasnodar and Khabarovsk Territories, the Republics of Altai, Bashkortostan and Kalmykia, the Volgograd, Nizhny Novgorod, Novosibirsk, Omsk, Samara and Chelyabinsk Regions - and in Moscow .

Diseases will also undermine the health of the population.

We are talking about an influenza pandemic caused by the spread of virus A (H5N1), which overcame the species barrier between birds and humans and changed its biological properties towards increased pathogenicity.

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), in the coming years, the emergence of a new influenza virus is predicted, to which the population will completely lack immunity, and therefore the morbidity and mortality of the population will sharply increase.

Summing up what was said, Shoigu said that it will be difficult to cope with all this, but the rescuers are ready for anything. True, in order to improve their work, Russia urgently needs to create a national crisis management center. According to the minister, such a center, branched across regions, can improve coordination in case of possible emergencies. It is expected that the overall system will be created within two years, and the federal part of the national center will begin work before the end of 2006.