Russia: Cold Enough for ‘ya?

Russia is having trouble keeping the lights on.

I remember the optimism of the late ’90s, when we naively thought that Russia would be a grown-up country, we would all work together to make the world a more stable place, we could turn our nuclear swords into nuclear plowshares^[2].

But greed and lust for power overtook their leadership.

Boney T^[1] was describing Rasputin, but it could just as well be Putin.

But when his drinking and lusting / And his hunger for power 
Became known to more and more people
The demands to do something / About this outrageous man / Became louder and louder

The corruption and diversion of state funds to Oligarchs and the war machine have left Russia unable to provide basic services to its civilians.

From Metro.co.uk:

From The Moscow Times:

Utility provider Siberian Generating Company said six hospitals, as well as eight schools and kindergartens, are also in the area affected by the heating outage.

Temperatures in Novosibirsk are expected to drop from a frigid minus 20 degrees Celsius on Wednesday to an even more bone-chilling minus 30 C on Thursday.

At least five residents were injured by boiling water that flooded city streets, health officials told local media.

Following a similar pipe burst last week, hundreds of Novosibirsk residents reportedly still do not have heating in their homes.

Unprecedented heating outages have been multiplying in Russian cities since the New Year holidays, with freezing temperatures across much of the country compounding the severity of what is quickly growing into a major crisis for the authorities.
The Moscow Times

From The Essa News:

Siberian freeze, Novosibirsk and Moscow suffer heating crisis amid bitter cold

Novosibirsk is Siberia’s largest city, and the third largest city in Russia (1,620,162 residents) following Moscow and St. Petersburg. The area is going through an extreme cold spell, with the mercury dipping below -4 F.

Additionally, the city has been hit with a huge malfunction. Reports from platform X indicate that a central heating pipe installed in 1974 has ruptured, resulting in flood-like conditions in Novosibirsk. Many neighborhoods have lost heating and hot water, and the night temperature reaches around -13 F.

Kremlin reacts to power outage

Putin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, attributed this heating crisis in many regions to excessive cold and worsening conditions of housing and community services, asserting that it “takes time to fix.”

He further assured that lessons would be learned from these challenges, but pointed out that “the Kremlin has no complaints against the work of officials and specialized services.”