The Christmas weekend in Moscow saw an unusually heavy cloudburst of the rare freezing rain. The freezing rain, or the ice rain, becomes overcooled when passing through a sub-freezing layer of air and then freezes upon impact with any object it encounters. While sub-zero temperatures and snow are typical for Moscow’s winter months, the glaze resulting from the ice rain is quite unusual.
This time the heavy rain freezing left an inch thick treacherous layer of glaze on all Moscow region’s roads and runways, covered all buildings and vehicles. Many trees and power cables were broken under ice’s weight.
The ice rain led to a shutdown of about 560 power stations and to power cuts in more than 70 towns around Moscow leaving more than 400,000 people without electricity. It resulted in cancellations of hundreds of flights and turned city streets into ice rinks with enormous traffic jams. According to Russian news agencies, 1,350 people were taken to hospital in the Moscow area with ice-related injuries, while 27 were wounded by falling trees weighed down by ice.
The only “positive” result of this disaster is the beautiful freezing rain pictures taken by Moscow citizens after the ice raining.
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