site.btaParliament Gives Deputy PM, Energy, Environment Ministers Hearing on Snowfall Disaster Response

Parliament Gives Deputy PM, Energy, Environment Ministers Hearing on Snowfall Disaster Response

Sofia, March 12 (BTA) - Bulgaria's Parliament Thursday gave
Deputy Prime Minister Meglena Kuneva, Energy Minister
Temenouzhka Petkova, Regional Development and Public Works
Minister Liliyana Pavlova and Environment and Water Minister
Ivelina Vassileva a hearing on the action taken to mitigate the
effects of heavy snowfall since March 7.

Kuneva said that this time the Government coped adequately with
the coordination of the disaster response effort.

Petkova said that 57,230 customers in 9,393 places of South
Central and Southeastern Bulgaria, served by EVN, were still
without electricity on March 11. On March 7, 1,179 settlements
or 271,000 customers countrywide were cut off power supply.
Flooding has closed some operations at the Maritsa East Mines.
The area of Kuddjali and other areas were inspected by army
helicopters on March 9 to find where power lines were broken and
 where the situation was most serious. All customers of CEZ,
which supplies electricity in Western Bulgaria, were reconnected
 by March 11, but 407 places served by EVN remained without
electricity.

Pavlova said that more than 950 special-purpose vehicles worked
in the snowbound areas, and over 130 vehicles were sent to
municipality centres.

Vassileva warned that measures should be taken to deal with
substantial amounts of water which the thawing of the snow is
expected to produce. Dam owners and operators are tasked with
making arrangements to free capacity and ensure conductivity of
the river beds up to 500 m downstream from the dam walls. The
Road Infrastructure Agency is cleaning critical sections around
bridges.

Interdepartmental working groups have clarified the ownership of
 253 out of 268 dams in Bulgaria whose owners were unidentified,
 the Environment Minister said.

In a related development, the Education and Science Ministry
said in a press release that classes will not be resumed at 125
schools countrywide on Thursday due to bad road conditions,
severe weather and problems with power supply and heating.