Subject of evacuation

Residents of Koryakia are being transported from areas destroyed by the earthquake

A powerful earthquake that literally paralyzed an entire Russian region could happen again. Thousands of residents of Koryakia, who have been literally living on the streets since Friday, in severe frost, will have to spend several more anxious nights. Heads of territorial bodies of the Ministry of Emergency Situations, trying to establish a stable air bridge between the “mainland” and the long-suffering autonomous region for the partial evacuation of people and supplying the most necessary things to those who may have to survive new tremors.

Seismologists note increased activity throughout the Kurile-Kamchatka belt. A few days before the earthquake in Koryakia, one of the largest volcanoes in Kamchatka, Bezymianny, awoke, and now huge stones are flying from its crater, and a plume of ash stretches for almost 300 km. And on April 21, two tremors were recorded in Koryakia with a magnitude at the epicenter of up to 7.8 on the Richter scale and a strength of 9-9.5 points. This is the strongest earthquake in this region in the last century, and only thanks to the sparse population and timely warning of residents, casualties were avoided. According to the Ministry of Emergency Situations, 37 people are considered injured, seven of them received serious injuries.

As the head of the Far Eastern Regional Center of the Russian Ministry of Emergency Situations, Viktor Kapkanshchikov, told a Vremya Novostei correspondent, the heads of rural settlements immediately after the start of the tremors took people to the hills and the coast, stationed observers who, if a tsunami was approaching, were supposed to notify the villagers about it. Fortunately, the forecast about the possibility of rogue waves approaching the Kamchatka coast did not come true. As Vladimir Bormotov, head of the seismicity forecast laboratory at the Institute of Tectonics and Geophysics, Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, told Vremya Novostey, the epicenter of the earthquake was at a depth of 40 km on the mainland. Tremors of varying strengths and magnitudes continue to this day. In total, about 60 earthquakes have been recorded in the Olyutorsky region over the past two days. It shakes here literally every fifteen minutes. According to the vice-governor of the Koryak Autonomous Okrug, Zhanna Saksina, tremors with a magnitude of up to five continue to destroy houses; staircases have collapsed in many buildings. The total damage, according to the district governor Oleg Kozhemyaki, can be estimated at almost 1.5 billion rubles.

There are about 11 thousand people in the disaster zone - the population of the almost completely destroyed villages of Tilichiki and Korf, as well as the villages of Khailino, Pakhachi and Vyvenka. People have been staying on the street for three days now, afraid to even come close to buildings that could collapse at any moment. They live in trailers and tents. The situation is complicated by fairly low temperatures - at night the thermometer drops to 20 degrees below zero. Local entrepreneurs have raised prices for food and basic necessities. A pack of instant noodles, which cost no more than 16 rubles before the earthquake, now sells for 30.

In this situation, the authorities of the district and Kamchatka region decided to partially evacuate the residents of the earthquake-affected villages. According to the first deputy governor of the region, Alexander Chistyakov, Kamchatka is ready to accept about 700 people. Over the weekend, return flights that delivered humanitarian supplies to Korf and Tilichiki brought about 400 people, mostly children and women, to boarding houses, hospitals and sanatoriums in the region.

Organizing an air bridge was not easy - the runway in the village of Tilichiki was completely destroyed by the earthquake. As Viktor Kapkanshchikov explained, they decided to transfer food, warm clothes, diesel generators to Kamchatka by planes of the Ministry of Emergency Situations from Moscow and Khabarovsk, and then from Elizovo airport and the village of Ossora in the Koryak Autonomous Okrug with the help of small aircraft to the site of the natural disaster. Experts have already arrived there: rescuers, doctors, psychologists and a group of seismologists from the Institute of Volcanology and Seismology of the Far Eastern Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences, who are assessing underground activity on the spot and making a forecast of seismicity in the area for the near future.

According to seismologists, the likelihood of a repeat of a destructive earthquake is very high. The Kamchatka branch of the Russian Expert Council on Earthquake Forecasting said: “The following dangerous strong aftershocks (aftershocks) are likely to occur in the source area within a week; earthquakes with a magnitude higher than six are possible.” At the same time, scientists assure that three tremors will be of magnitude 6-6.4, another one will be 6.5-6.9 and, finally, with a probability of 80%, an earthquake of 7.4 points. In connection with this forecast, “all services of the autonomy are in full readiness for possible repeated earthquakes,” reported the operational headquarters of the Ministry of Emergency Situations.

Ilya SERGEEV, Palana