14 DAY TRIAL // Disney's “Frozen” might be a work of fiction from beginning to end, but this does not mean that having entire realms become encased in ice in the blink of an eye can't happen in real life. Things like this can most certainly happen and the town of Dudinka in Russia stands as proof.
Not to beat about the bush, reports say that this remote town in central Siberia is now one mammoth block of ice. That's right, streets, cars and even homes in this corner of the world are now buried under a thick layer of frozen water.
How a town becomes an ice sculpture
As mentioned, the town of Dudinka lies in central Siberia. More precisely, it is the administrative center of the Taymyrsky Dolgano-Nenetsky District of Russia's Krasnoyarsk Krai. The town might have a fancy designation but the fact of the matter is that it is rather small and has just 22,000 residents.
Word has it that, earlier this month, a freakishly cold storm hit the region that is home to this Russian town. During this storm, quite a lot of the local water pipes burst, among them the main one. As a result, massive amounts of water spilled and ended up covering local streets.
The thing about Siberia is that, when it gets cold, it gets insanely cold. On the night that the water pipes burst, temperatures in the town of Dudinka dropped to a jaw-dropping -40 degrees Celsius (-104 degrees Fahrenheit). Quick reminder: water freezes at 0 degrees Celsius (32 degrees Fahrenheit).
Hence, all the water emerging from the broken pipes in Dudinka froze almost as soon as it hit the cold air. The more water spilled on local streets, the more ice formed. Eventually, the entire town ended up looking like a rather disturbing ice sculpture.
“Anybody in doubt of exactly how cold it is here just need to look at the pictures. Even the hot water pipes were freezing, and the water that flooded out quickly formed into a solid block,” government spokesman Eugene Gerasimov said in a statement, as cited by DM.
The Russian town is now in a state of emergency
Following this incident, most of the homes in Dudinka were left without water or electricity. Local authorities were left with no choice but to declare a state of emergency. Presently, it is unclear how it is that town officials plan to get rid of all the ice. They might just let it melt on its own.
What this means is that folks living in this remote corner of Russia might have to wait until summer to recover the cars encased in ice and say goodbye to the massive icicles now clinging to apartment blocks and other buildings.
If you have a few minutes to spare and want to get a better idea of just how bad winters in Russia can turn out to be, check out the gallery below. The photos included in it were shared with the public by Dudinka local and show what this town looks like now that it is encased in ice.
