http://www.newsday.com/ap/rnmpne0c.htm

-- absecom (zero@pobox.com), January 08, 2000

Answers

hot link please.

best wishes

-- bob (BOB@ghoward-oxley.demon.uk), January 08, 2000.

Link

Heating Failure in Russia's Far East

MOSCOW (AP) -- Thousands of people in Russia's Far East were without central heating for a second day Saturday as temperatures hovered around minus 15 degrees, a news report said.

About 6,800 residents in the village of Ugolnye Kopi lost heating on Friday because a pump supplying water to the village's central boiler failed, the ITAR-Tass news agency said.

Another 2,100 people in Mys Shmidta lost heating for the same reason Saturday, but heating was restored to about half of the people later in the day, according to the report.

Mys Shmidta is located on the Chukchi Sea coast above the Arctic Circle, while Ugolnye Kopi is just below the Arctic Circle on the Bering Sea. ITAR-Tass said people in the villages were using electric heaters in an effort to keep their apartments warm.

-- this is not a y2k problem (but@you.know.that), January 08, 2000.

So they lost heat, but not electricity? How does that work? thanks.

-- nbljd;ljwelbl (bkgkgka@jjkpksjaj.com), January 08, 2000.

I have worked with hydronic heating systems for 20 years. The only control a boiler feedwater pump needs is an on/off switch (starter) and maybe a pressure regulater. There is no date or time function; the pump runs continuously while the boiler is in operation. Pumps fail because the impeller wears out/breaks or the bearings fail from lack of lubrication. I'd have to say this is not Y2K.

-- John Littmann (littmannj@aol.com), January 08, 2000.

No question, the former Soviet Union is held together with bear skins and stone knives. Nothing gets upgraded over there (or damn little). I believe their bus mechanics are geniuses because they keep them running way beyond useful life.

Its hard to believe that we had an arms race going with them and we thought they were a huge threat when the entire country has been decaying for decades. I spent three weeks in Ukraine, three in Belarus and three in Russia one summer on an unsupervised trip. What an eye opener. I didn't enjoy the trip but I learned a lot.

-- Guy Daley (guydaley@bwn.net), January 08, 2000.

Guy,

I agree. I've been on 6 different month+ trips to Eastern Europe/Former Soviet Union so tell me I'm not a glutten for punishment. My CIS visits ended when I got yanked off a train at a Russian Ukrainian border village, by Kalisnikov toting border guards, for not having the right visa. Three days and about $500 later- for a piece of paper just to hand to someone so I could get on a departure plane in Moscow- I figured it wasn't 'my cup of tea'.

Russia isn't (and never was) anything more than a 3rd world basket case.

I posted this on an earlier thread on heating probs in their Far East:

Back about five years ago I got involved in a Russian Far East fuel deal. It was a real eye opener. I lined up a source for some gas oil (heating oil) to go into Kamchatka. I knew some guys at MAPCO who own a refinery in Alaska. They reluctantly went along and agreed to supply the fuel. We had the small tanker to load at the refinery and then my Russian trader contacts (Sidanko, 2nd largest Russian oil company at the time) were going to lighter into another Russian tanker out at sea (unusual). The Mapco guys turned out ot be right. The deal never came to pass but I learned a lot about the games that are played and why the Russian Far East never has fuel. These Russian oil traders, or a better word would be embezzlers, get Moscow permission and all the bureaucratic paperwork done (read payoffs) to import the fuel. China was booming back then. So the fuel gets bought, it gets shipped to China instead of the Russian Far East. The funds go from China into some offshore bank account in Cyprus and the Kamchatkins go without fuel all winter.

-- Downstreamer (downstream@bigfoot.com), January 08, 2000.

I worked for a newspaper a few years ago and a local couple traveling in Russia and the eastern block countries sent us emails and faxes about their experiences, which we published.

Every correspondence told of power outages, no available water and various infrastructure failures.

I'd be real hesitant to blame any failures on Y2K.

-- (I'm@pol.ly), January 08, 2000.

I remember pretty much exactly similar stories from last year about these Siberian villages and heat problems..it was so bad evacuation was considered.

-- John H Krempasky (johnk@dmv.com), January 08, 2000.