Georgia's Big Freeze Nightmare

By Margarita Akhvlediani, Gena Abarovich, and Rita Karapetian

TBILISI, Georgia, January 30, 2006 (ENS) - Russia resumed gas supplies to Georgia and Armenia on Sunday after repair of the North Caucasus-Transcaucasia pipeline that was damaged nine days ago by explosions that Russia blamed on terrorists.

"The pipeline has been purged of an explosive gas-air mixture and the tap has been turned. Gas will flow to Georgia and further to Armenia," Viktor Krainov, director of Kavkaztransgaz gas transport company's Mozdok gas pipeline department, told Russia's Interfax news agency.

Repairs on the Mozdok-Tbilisi pipeline were finished on January 28, and the damage caused by the explosions has been fully patched over, the Gazprom press service said Saturday.

Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, was struck by a cold front last week just as energy supplies were cut off. (Photo courtesy EWP)

As a cold snap gripped the region, Georgians shivered for a week without light or heat, while Armenians escaped the worst of the energy crisis.

Tbilisi housewife Tea Metreveli summed up the situation for herself and her family in one word, “terrible.” With heavy snowfalls, no gas and now no electricity, city life had suddenly become a nightmare. “I have two children aged six and 11 months,” said Metreveli. “While there was electricity we could at least keep warm with the help of reflector heaters. But we haven’t had electricity for 24 hours."

“My husband left this morning to look for kerosene and went round almost the whole city. He just called and he was happy because he’s found some on the outskirts. But he’s been queuing for four hours. I dressed the children in everything warm we had, with two coats each.”

On January 22, a series of explosions along two gas pipelines in North Ossetia and one electricity line in Karachai-Cherkessia plunged Georgia into a pre-modern world all of a sudden during some of the coldest winter weather anyone can remember.

The situation got dramatically worse on the night of January 25-26. A heavy storm brought down power lines from Georgia’s largest power station on the River Inguri and also crippled the Tbilisi power station. Parts of western Georgia were damaged by the storm and much of the country was blacked out.

As a result of the breakdown in Russian energy supplies and interruptions to Georgia’s domestic provision, large parts of Tbilisi lost both electricity and gas as temperatures sank to minus 12 degrees Celsuis. With snow and ice freezing pipes, many people were without water as well.

Bundled up against the bitter cold, Tbilsi residents queue for scarce supplies of fuel. (Photo courtesy The Messenger)

One elderly woman, who had already stood for several hours in the cold in a queue for kerosene, had knitted woollen stockings on top of her hat and around her neck. She did not want to talk and burst into tears.

“We don’t have kerosene, but even if we did, we couldn’t get it,” said grandmother and retired engineer Nato Mikiashvili. “The price has doubled and we simply can’t afford it. My grandson is three and we dressed him in everything we could but he still’s whining because it’s cold.

“We don’t have water because we live in the upper part of the town where there should be pumps to make the water work. We don’t have any light. The one thing we do have is a liquid gas bottle, but we are conserving it. We just use it to cook something quickly. If it ends it will be hard to fill up because of the queues and the big shortages.”

Heavy snowfalls in Tbilisi virtually shut down public transport. The crush in the metro was so intense that there are now restrictions on people using the system. Most schools are closed.

Georgian Prime Minister Zurab Nogaideli said the gas began flowing again on Sunday. (Photo credit unknown)

Armenia, which suffered acute energy shortages in the 1990s, appeared better equipped for a crisis this time. Although all supplies of Russian gas - which it receives via Georgia - were cut off, almost all Armenians were supplied with emergency reserves.

But Shushan Sardarian of the gas company ArmRosgazprom said if shipments were not restored by January 25, then the company would start a rationing schedule - though it would hit factories before it affected ordinary people.

Almost half of vehicles and the majority of minibuses in Yerevan use gas and the shortages threatened to hit public transport, already suffering from heavy snowfalls.

“If there is no gas, I can’t drive out,” said Volodya, a minibus driver, predicting that transport prices and the cost of other goods would shoot up.

{Published in cooperation with the Institute for War and Peace Reporting. Margarita Akhvlediani is IWPR’s regional director and editor in Tbilisi. Reporter Gena Abarovich is based in Tbilisi. Rita Karapetian works for Noyan Tapan news agency in Yerevan.}