International   

Major power outage in Moscow

Vladimir Radyuhin

MOSCOW: A massive power outage in Moscow wrought havoc to the Russian capital and adjacent regions on Wednesday.

A fire in a Moscow power station led to a cascading failure reminiscent of the 2003 blackout in New York.

City transport ground to a halt, an explosion racked a chemical factory, hospitals were cut off from electricity supply and cellular telephone services shut down.

The biggest blackout in Moscow's history ripped through the city on Wednesday morning,

Poisonous cloud

Power failures affected the area as far as 200 km outside Moscow, leaving 24 cities without electricity. An explosion caused by the power failure tore through a major chemical plant in Tula, sending a poisonous cloud of phenol towards the city. The outage forced a petroleum factory in Moscow to release by-product gases into the air creating a health hazard in adjacent residential areas.

Tens of thousands of commuters got stuck in trains halfway between stations and in elevators across the city. Huge traffic jams paralysed central and southern parts of the city, as traffic lights went out. Electric pumps were stalled stopping the flow of drinking water to multi-storeyed apartments in some districts of the capital. The incident was aggravated by sweltering heat as daytime temperatures hit an all-time record of 32 degrees Centigrade for this part of the year.

Fifteen hospitals suffered a blackout and the Moscow stock exchange stopped trading for several hours.

President Vladimir Putin blamed the power monopoly, Unified Energy System, for the crisis. "They should work not only on global problems about company policy and its restructuring, but also pay attention to current activity," he said in a clear jab at UES head Anatoly Chubais.

The blackout may cut short the career of Mr. Chubais..

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

International

News: Front Page | National | Tamil Nadu | Andhra Pradesh | Karnataka | Kerala | New Delhi | Other States | International | Opinion | Business | Sport | Miscellaneous | Engagements |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary | Updates: Breaking News |

Stories in this Section

Iraq peace "at least five years away"
Defection blow to Schroeder
Flood havoc in Bangladesh
Major power outage in Moscow
2 reformers cleared in Iran
Chess battles: advantage computers
Ismail Merchant dead
Kalam arrives in Geneva
``A magnanimous human being''

Copyright © 2005, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu