INCREASINGLY DRAMATIC SITUATION CAUSED BY SNOW AND SIBERIAN TEMPERATURES

7. February 2012.

In yesterday’s rescue operation, members of the Department for Emergency Situations rescued Bozidar Nikolic from the village of Macedonce, which is situated in the municipality of Medvedja. Mr. Nikolic had been snowed-in and cut off from the rest of the world for a whole month, while he had run out of food and medicine seven days before being rescued. Firefighters from Medvedja, who had waded through the snowdrifts for hours, brought him food packages and medicine.

Apart from lacks of food and medicine, residents of the snowed-in villages in the region have problems with how to feed the cattle and provide water to it, since the water-springs had frozen. The villagers that have a larger number of sheep or cows melt snow in the cauldrons to get water for the cattle.

The firefighters from Medvedja say that getting food and medicine to elderly family households along the Serbia-Kosovo administrative line is the priority.

„There are villages and households that have been snowbound for as long as one month, so that it is difficult for us, who carry heavy rescue equipment, to reach them. However, we have a plan, so that we deliver some canned food on a daily basis to the most vulnerable persons, who are mostly the ailing elderly persons and persons with young children“, said Rajko Milosevic, the Commander of the Firefighting Department in Medvedja.

According to the data of the Department for Emergency Situations, 70 households in the mountainous villages of Medvedja, Crna Trava and Leskovac are the most threatened ones in the Jablanica district.

„Over the next two to three days, apart from having the additional snow removing equipment, we shan’t wait for the paths to the most threatened persons to be cleaned of snow, but we shall deliver them food on foot. It is important for us to know exactly where the people are most threatened and we are willing to work around-the-clock. At the moment, removing snow from the road to the village of Ravni Del is the priority. I hope that we will manage to rescue those people, who had been snowbound in their village for 40 days“, Mr. Marjanovic said.