Flood is coming

Record snowfalls that have taken place in Ukraine in late March are posing a great flooding threat. Kyiv may face the most severe losses caused by the weather. Great water that will come to the capital in only few weeks, as soon as the snow melts, will reveal all the mistakes and negligence of the authorities. On the other hand, the power can still use this time for thorough preparations in order to prevent the catastrophe.

 Starting from Saturday (March 30), when the temperature rises above zero, the huge snow masses will begin to melt actively. The authorities have announced that 40 million tons of snow are have dropped on Kyiv’s territory, with 10 million tons – in the city streets. Oleksandr Serhiienko, director of the analytical-research center “Institute of the City,” says that this figure is not realistic. “They simply multiplied Kyiv’s area, 83,000 hectares, by the average depth of snow layer [48 centimeters. – Author]. The layer of water which is seven centimeters deep; if it is poured over the entire territory of Kyiv equally, I cannot say it will cause any catastrophe. But the problem is that the locality of the capital is quite uneven. And the main problem is how the sewerage will work in the low places,” the expert explains. He says Kyiv will survive the first wave of snow melting, which will start in the end of this week, without any problems. “If ‘Kyivvodokanal’ and local authorities keep the sewerage in proper condition, Kyiv is not in danger.”

 At the same time the mayor’s office employees assure that next weekend there won’t be any substantial melting of the snow. “As for melting of the snow on Saturday and Sunday, I assure you, there will be no need to evacuate people. Probably, at some places the water won’t drain completely and will cover the roads ankle-deep. But it won’t cause flooding of buildings, evacuations, etc.,” Deputy Head of the Kyiv City State Administration (KMDA) Anatolii Holubchenko stated. He says in the following one day or two the employees of public utilities will again check the state of all the sewers and clear them from the snow.

According to him, the KMDA is developing measures to prevent the flooding and liquidate the aftermaths of spring flooding on the rivers. With this aim the calculation of possible rising of the water level in the rivers is done in order to define which houses face possible flooding. At the same time he admitted that according to preliminary estimations, there will be no substantial rising of the Dnipro water level, although local impoundment in Podil, Obolon, and Poshtova Square may take place. “The flooding usually starts after April 20, when the water from Belarusian woods and Russia comes, and by that time proper preventive measures will be developed,” the official underlined.

But this poses a threat of an ecological catastrophe. According to head of Kyiv-based ecological-cultural center Volodymyr Boreiko, the snow has absorbed too many harmful substances from the air and the ground. “It’s like cotton wool. It seems to be white, but in fact it contains many harmful substances, the car emissions, and grease,” the ecologist underlined. In his words “these harmful substances later will go into the Dnipro, because on Kyivavtodor’s sewers there are no proper cleaning facilities.” Moscow, for example, has several years ago bought snow-melting machines. They have special big containers with high temperatures. The snow is gathered, melted and the pipe goes out to the sewerage,” the ecologist says. Moreover, Kyivvodokanal has all necessary capacities to cope with additional amounts of water. Since early 1990s the water consumption in the capital has halved, dropping to one million liters.