State of emergency declared in Elbrus district

A mudflow damaged the bridge supports on the federal highway leading to the Elbrus resort, traffic on the highway is closed. Some residents of Tyrnyauz were evacuated, in some areas of the city there is no water, electricity or gas.

As "Kavkazsky Uzel" wrote, on August 14, 2017, after a mudflow in Tyrnyauz, the Gerkhozhan-Su pedestrian bridge was destroyed and a state of emergency was declared. 978 people were evacuated. They returned to their homes on the morning of August 15, but on the same day, the authorities again began evacuating people from the flooded area. This time, 420 people were evacuated, and were able to get to their homes only on August 16.

A road bridge on the federal highway leading to the Elbrus resort was damaged as a result of a mudflow in the city of Tyrnyauz in Kabardino-Balkaria, TASS reported today.

As a result of a mudflow along the mudflow channel of the Gerkhozhan-Suu River in Tyrnyauz, a support for the bridge on the federal highway Prokhladny-Baksan-Elbrus was damaged. An operational group of the Russian Emergencies Ministry for the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic and traffic police crews are on duty at the scene. "Traffic on this section of the highway is closed in both directions. Despite the presence of bypass routes, the State Traffic Safety Inspectorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic strongly recommends that drivers refrain from driving in this direction," the administration of the Elbrus District reported today.

As of 07:30 Moscow time, mudflows continue to descend along Gerkhozhan-Suu, said the head of the republic, Kazbek Kokov. "A regional emergency regime has been declared in the Elbrus District. Part of the city of Tyrnyauz remains without electricity, water and gas supply. A temporary accommodation center has been set up at Secondary School No. 3," he wrote on his Telegram channel.

The Tyrnyauz administration reported that residents whose houses are located near the bridge are being evacuated. They also called for people to collect water, as it could be turned off, and to charge electrical appliances.

The cable car at the Elbrus resort is working; athletes who are training on the glacier were lifted this morning. "But for now, some employees, like tourists, cannot get to the resort due to the blocked highway and restoration work," the resort's Telegram channel says.

Recall that in 2018, geophysicists warned the authorities of Kabardino-Balkaria about the need for urgent repairs to the mudflow channel in Tyrnyauz and the organization of a system to warn people about the threat of mudflows. "The potential for mudflows in the Gerkhozhan-Su River basin is enormous, and no decrease in mudflow activity is expected in the future," the acting head of the region, in particular, said. Head of the Department of Environmental Research at the High-Mountain Geophysical Institute Mikhail Dokukin.

In June 2021, the Ministry of Emergency Situations reported that a round-the-clock post had been set up on the Gerkhozhan-Su River to monitor possible mudflows. Specialists from the High-Mountain Geophysical Institute conducted a survey of the Buzulgan landslide in August-September 2020. Over the two weeks that the survey lasted, the landslide moved down by 20 meters, and its lower boundary was two kilometers from Tyrnyauz. "In order to avoid catastrophic consequences from mudflows with a possible increased volume of removal in the future, it is necessary to clear the mudflow channel from deposits of previous mudflows and reconstruct it," the institute said at the time.

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