Snowstorm blankets highways, snaps power lines across Pridnestrovie

A snowstorm blanketed Pridnestrovie, snapping powerlines and leaving some residents in the dark for up to 6 hours

BENDER (Tiraspol Times) - Pridnestrovie’s first major snowstorm of the year forced highway closures and denied electricity to some 5,000 customers during Wednesday and Thursday of this week.

Snowfall in Bender, the second-largest city of Pridnestrovie, measured just under a foot, and the snow continued overnight as the storm stalled over the Dniester river and brought down powerlines in this new and emerging country.

Dozens of semis remained stuck along the closed Rybnitsa-Tiraspol highway and parked in gas station parking lots as truckers waited for the road to be reopened.

The large accumulation of heavy wet snow snapped branches and caused some trees to collapse, often knocking down power lines. Some 5,000 electricity customers were without power. The outages were the worst in and around the villages of Gîsca and Protagailovka, where homes went without power for six hours, but outages were also reported in parts of Dubossary and Tiraspol, the country's capital. As the storm moved south, Slobozya, in the south of Pridnestrovie, was affected and suffered blackouts which continued until evening while emergency repair teams worked overtime to restore power.

As city crews and emergency workers on Thursday continued to clean up snow-packed streets and highways, emergency officials said that most power outages across the Lower Dniester Valley have been repaired.

The snowstorm that buried Pridnestrovie's southern region this week also knocked down power lines, leaving some area residents without electricity for as long as six hours.

State provides aid to storm victims

Victor Nikolayenko, the head of the country's Republican Civil Protection Agency's Division of Emergency Management, warned residents that the storm could continue over the weekend and that within the next few days the wind gusts can reach 18 to 20 meters per second.

" - These are what we call "local anomalies", when, as a whole in the republic, weather conditions are normal, but then in separate places, they are extraordinary. At New Years, the wind knocked down a fir tree in Bender. In the outskirts of Grigoriopol, there are cases where the storm damaged the roofs of several houses. The Emergency Management team in that district is working right now, they will cover the damage from the local budget. If need be, they will also achieve help from the Republican Civil Protection Agency, on a national level."

According to PMR state-owned news agency Olvia Press, the emergency response unit of the Republican Civil Protection Agency announced reported no fatalies or other serious emergencies related to the snowstorm.

Pridnestrovie, which is also known internationally as Transnistria or Transdniester, receives no financial aid or emergency management help from neighboring Moldova or Ukraine. Ever since it declared independence in 1990, it has managed its own domestic affairs with no outside interference. Although unrecognized, it meets the requirements for statehood under international law, and its state institutions function as a de facto independent nation; responding to natural disasters and emergencies and providing social services for the region's 555,000 citizens.

PMR's government institutions react better than Moldova's

Moldova, on the Western side of the Dniester river, suffered equally devastating results from the same snowstorm. However, it has not been as successful to respond quickly, and much of the country is heading into the weekend while still in the dark, with no power and no telephone connections whatsoever.

As many as 261 areas in southern and central Moldova continue to be cut off from power, according to the press centre of the Interior Ministry's Department for Emergencies (DSE).
According to an official information by Moldova's state news agency Moldpres, 64 areas have gone for 3 days with no telephone connections either. Moldpres reports that only 337 people are involved in the repair work. This compares badly with Pridnestrovie, where services got restored much faster thanks to 1,240 government emergency staff and government-assigned volunteers.

Pridnestrovie has its own government institutions and functions as a viable economy. For nearly 17 years, it has managed successfully on its own without any help from Moldova.
The unrecognized country covers a territory twice the size of Luxembourg. In terms of citizens, it has double the population of Iceland and approximately the same number of people as Montenegro which declared independence in 2005 and is the latest country to become a member of the United Nations.

See also:
» PMR's government spends $24M on roads, and not a dime from Moldova