RUSSIAN TROOPS DIG CANAL TO BAR FIRE FROM ATOM SITE
Baku, August 7 (AZERTAC). Russian troops dug a 8-km long canal to keep fires caused by a record heat wave away from a nuclear arms site, local media said on Saturday as air pollution from the crisis rose to more than six times above normal.
Forest and peat fires by the highest temperatures ever registered in Russia have killed at least 52 people, made more than 4,000 homeless, diverted many flights and forced Muscovites to wear surgical masks to filter out foul air.
`The fire situation in the Moscow region is still tense, but there is no danger either for residential areas or for economic sites,` an Emergencies Ministry spokesman said.
Weather forecasts said the smoke, which has reached even underground metro stations, would persist until Wednesday.
Echo Moskvy radio station said army troops excavated the canal to prevent the flames from advancing into the Sarov nuclear arms facility, ringed by forest in the Niznhy Novgorod region around 350 kilometres east of Moscow.
The Emergencies Ministry said the situation in Sarov had `stabilized`. Sarov is a closed town whose nuclear site produced the first Soviet atomic bomb in 1949 and remains the main nuclear design and production facility in Russia.
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