State of emergency, blackout in Russia’s Crimea after transmission towers in Ukraine blown up
Russia’s Crimea has switched to autonomous reserve power after transmission towers in the adjacent Ukrainian Kherson region were blown up, causing a blackout. Meanwhile, the Right Sector and Crimean Tatar “activists” have been attempting to block repairs.
Ukraine turns down Russia’s help in electricity supplies resumption
http://tass.ru/en/world/838357
MOSCOW, November 22. /TASS/. Ukraine has turned down Russia’s assistance in resuming electricity supplies to Crimea and said it will do repair works on its own, an insider source told TASS on Sunday.
Russia offered its help to Ukraine. They turned it down. Contact are maintained on a permanent basis. Ukraine will do repair work on its own," the source said.
Crimea was cut off electricity supplies at 00:22 a.m. Moscow time. Electricity supplies were disrupted via all the four transmission lines running from Ukraine. Two of them went out of service on Friday when transmission towers were damaged. The other two were blown up last night. Crimea’s authorities have imposed a state of emergency regime.
The incident has caused electricity problems to consumers in Ukraine too.
"The Ukrainian authorities are interested in the soonest resumption of electricity. Now demining works are underway there," the source said.
All Crimean cities supplied with electricity - emergency headquarters
http://tass.ru/en/economy/838346
SIMFEROPOL, November 22. /TASS/. All large cities on the Crimean peninsula are supplied with electric power after electricity supplies from Ukraine were completely cut off, Crimea’s First Vice-Premier Mikhail Sheremet said on Sunday.
"We actually have all the cities connected [to power supply]," said Sheremet who heads the headquarters for eliminating the consequences of an emergency situation on the Black Sea peninsula.
Powerful electricity supply generators will be sent to the regions experiencing difficulties with electric power supply," he added.
Fuel stocks for backup electric power supply sources in Crimea will suffice for at least 30 days, Crimea’s First Vice-Premier Mikhail Sheremet said on Sunday.
The schedules of electricity blackouts will be brought to the notice of local residents every two hours, he said.
The Crimean Energy Blockade: What You Need to Know
http://sputniknews.com/europe/20151122/1030550351/ukraine-crimea-energy-blockade
On Friday night, two of the four electricity transmission lines in the southern Ukrainian region of Kherson supplying power to Crimea were destroyed, with the remaining two blown up on Saturday night. As a result, beginning Saturday, 1.9 million of the peninsula’s 2.3 million residents were left without power, with authorities introducing a state of emergency.
Over 100 brigades armed with over 500 diesel generators have been dispatched to ensure the provision of power to socially important facilities, with authorities setting up an emergency schedule for the supply of electricity and water to areas hit by the outage.
At the moment, the Crimean peninsula relies on four major power lines from Ukraine for much of its electricity. These include the Melitopol-Dzhankoy line (330 kW), the Kakhovskaya-Dzhankoy line (300kW), the Kakhovskaya-Ostrovskaya line (330 kW) and the Kakhovka-Titan line (220 kW).
Ukrenergo emphasized that the downing of the lines to Crimea have affected the supply of power to Ukraine’s own southern regions, including Kherson and Mykolaiv. The situation is apparently so bad, Ukrenergo Deputy Director General Yuri Kasich said Sunday, that the shutdown of just one more element at the Kakhovskaya substation could have a “cascade effect,” leaving up to half of the Kherson and Mykolaiv regions without power.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian energy officials have formally rejected offers for assistance from the Russian energy ministry, assuring their colleagues that the situation was under control, a source in the Russian energy ministry told RIA Novosti.
Ukraine’s Ministry of Internal Affairs has since opened four criminal cases in connection with the destruction of the power lines, a police spokesman in the Kherson Region explaining that the charges include one count of a deliberate attempt to damage power facilities, two of causing bodily harm to the police, and a fourth count for deliberately obstructing the work of local journalists.