Moscow lies on average for 4 months under a thick layer of snow. With everything that goes with it: deep snow, black ice, plodding. A whole armada tries to master the snow masses, from oversized snow ploughs to people who tirelessly shovel snow everywhere with ordinary shovels. But the snow cannot simply be pushed aside – the mountains would grow into infinity – but have to be removed with trucks and melted down.
In addition, vast amounts of chemical thawing agents and road salt are used. However, the pretty salt crystals are not completely harmless – especially not in these quantities. Allegedly, a few years ago, a change was made from ordinary road salt to a much more expensive, chemically modified salt (with formic acid?) – in order to make it possible to steal money from the budget, so the theory goes.