02.02.2007, 00.24
MOSCOW, February 1 (Itar-Tass) - An orange-coloured snowfall in Russia’ s Siberian Omsk region on Wednesday was not radioactive, according to first lab tests made by specialists of the Russian Ministry for Emergency Situations and the Rospotrebnadzor consumer rights watchdog.
“At the present moment, we cannot give explanations to the snow which is oily to the touch and has a pronounced rotten smell, and we are waiting for the results of a thorough test on samples,” the environmental prosecutor of the Omsk region, Anton German, said.
“We have requested information about analogous phenomena across Russia. There have been similar cases, but only one of them was man-caused. In all other cases there were natural reasons behind coloured snowfalls: seaweeds, sand, etc.,” he stressed.
The abnormal snowfall covered the area of over 1,500 square kilometres with a half-centimetre layer of snow. Several dozen settlements with the population of about 3,000 people were hit.
There are no major industrial enterprises within the radius of 200 kilometres, and show there has always been renowned for its crystal cleanness and witness. These five districts of the Omsk region are a zone, where ecologically clean agricultural products are grown.
On Thursday, the Russian Ministry for Emergency Situations sent to the region an Il-76 plane with a chemical laboratory. The task of the laboratory is to inspect the polluted regions and determine the level of danger from the abnormal snowfall.
The population has been informed about the danger, sources from the regional department of the emergencies ministry told Tass. They received, in particular, recommendations not to use snow for household or technical needs, keep animals indoors and stay away from that zone.
Meanwhile, the ministry reports that there have been no health complains from the local population.
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