Climate changes to spur floods in Russia

The number of flood disasters Russia will suffer over the next five years is likely to be much higher than the average owing to global climate changes, Vladislav Bolov, head of the Emergencies Ministry's Antistkhiya Center said on Tuesday. "Amid the expected rise in maximum water storage in the snowpack, the intensity of spring floods on the rivers of the Arkhangelsk region, Komi Republic, Yenisei and Lena river basins and the Ural territories will increase," Bolov said. The threat of flood disasters is highest in Russia's central European, north European regions, eastern Siberia and Kamchatka Peninsula. Bolov also said that the duration of the average flood period may increase twofold: from 12 to 24 days, or even more.