“We sleep in our clothes”: Crimeans described life without electricity after the hurricane

Ksenia lives in the Black Sea region, in the village of Novoselsky, which is 80 km from Yevpatoria. For the sixth day, a nursing mother with four children has been in a house without electricity, water or heating.

— All these days I left requests to the dispatchers of the Black Sea Distribution Zone, the CrimeaEnergo contact center, wrote to the unified dispatch center of the Black Sea region, called hotlines…. The children got sick, but how to treat them in such conditions?

Recently, a heating point was organized in the village. Ksenia tells what he looks like:

— The heating point is located at the school – it’s a table near the guard with an electric kettle and tea leaves. The teacher, who worked late at work, saw me with the small children and brought sugar so I could drink sweet tea.

Ksenia says that it’s unbearable to be at home – it’s colder there than outside.

– We sleep in our clothes. We don’t have gas. Everything relies on electricity: a well, a septic tank, heating, cooking. We buy drinking water from a vending machine for 3-4 rubles per liter.

There is no technical water at all, and no one supplies it. We buy few groceries, for almost every meal. The refrigerator does not work, but at a temperature of +10 in the house, they do not spoil very much.

I breastfeed my youngest and give him baby food. Thank God, the kindergarten and school are open, they are warm and the children are fed.

According to the interlocutor, the problem of energy collapse is also in companies servicing electrical networks. In September, the head of Crimea fired the former head of Krymenergo, Andrei Tsukarenko, who was suspected of exceeding his official powers. A criminal case was opened against the official. After his resignation, Tsukarenko flew to Turkey, from where, apparently, he has no intention of returning. The Investigative Committee put him on the wanted list.

“The locals don’t remember the last time the wires, poles, and transformers were replaced here,” Ksenia continues. — People write that now RES employees come, look at the problems and leave. Others will turn off the power to the broken wires and also leave.

Some say: the working day is over, others refer to the fact that this is not their field of activity. And people still suffer without electricity. It feels like there is no coordinated work. This happens either because of the mentality, or because of the low salaries of company employees.

In the chat of the administration of the Mezhvodnensky rural settlement, one of the residents wrote about the death of a pensioner: “Yakov Abkerimov lived without electricity for four days, he is 85 years old. He asked me to give me the head’s phone number. I gave. And in the evening he tearfully asked me to call them myself, but they didn’t answer the phone. I dialed and explained that the man was elderly and his food had spoiled. And they tell me that he got it, he’s calling everyone, but they don’t pick up the phone. I called him back, and he was already dead.”

The Administration of Mezhvodnensky rural settlement confirmed to us information about the death of the pensioner.

“He was sick, he was quite elderly. I can’t say for sure whether the situation with the lack of electricity affected him,” the administration employee explained. “That’s how everything works for us, we have water, it hasn’t disappeared.” Maybe only for a few hours. In general everything is fine.

— But people complain that there is no electricity and water?

– Well, somewhere there is something wrong, someone doesn’t like it, that’s their right.

“They’ve been without electricity for six days…

— There are not enough workers, but in general everything is fine, everything has been restored, everything is working…

Our second interlocutor, Emine, lives in the private sector of Simferopol.

— There has been no light since Sunday. The reason is a broken wire. Residents submitted applications to KrymEnergo, wrote to heads of various levels of government, but there was no result. It’s even paradoxical, they call us from KrymEnergo, and the first question is: do you have electricity? Where will it come from if no one came to us…

In the area where Emine lives, there is no electricity on three streets. There are about 30 families without electricity, including bedridden elderly people, small children, and large families.

“Yesterday I walked through the streets, and only a few families had generators. The rest sit by candles and lanterns. Children in jackets do their homework. The food in the refrigerator is spoiled, there is no way to swim or wash clothes. To charge our phones we go to our neighbors who have electricity. There are no aid or heating facilities. There is no information about the schedule and timing of repair work.

We have gas, we cook food. Purchases products for one day. We wash ourselves, like in the nineties, and heat water in a basin.

They say that a lot of requests are being received, and the repair teams do not have time to service everyone. It’s strange that we didn’t ask other regions for help. It turns out that our emergency workers simply cannot cope with such a volume of work.

Meanwhile, the “ChP Crimea” telegram channel published an anonymous review from an employee of the Distribution Zone: “You can’t imagine how many of you there are, and everyone is with children! And even me! I work both day and night, giving light to other people, although I myself have no light. I also want to relax and be with my family. Stay in my place!”