Three more Lithuanian districts declare storm emergencies

Ignalina, Mažeikiai and Kupiškis districts have declared municipality-level emergency situations following the weekend storm, LRT reported.

Ignalina District declared the emergency on Tuesday, while Mažeikiai and Kupiškis districts did so on Wednesday. Kazlų Rūda, Anykščiai, Biržai and Telšiai districts had previously taken the same step.

Kupiškis District Mayor Algirdas Raslanas said the municipality-level declaration would allow the mayor’s reserve fund to be used to compensate residents for losses. Without the declaration, the funds could not be accessed, he said.

“We are calculating the losses people suffered because of the damage. There were cases where things fell onto sheds, barns and houses, and some homes were badly damaged,” Raslanas told BNS.

About 800 people in Kupiškis District still have no electricity, down from nearly 5,000 immediately after the storm. Raslanas said prolonged outages had caused additional losses, including spoiled food and problems storing milk.

He said the emergency declaration had also prompted the Energy Distribution Operator to send additional resources to the district. However, he criticised the delayed offer of assistance from the Lithuanian Armed Forces, saying it should have been made on the morning after the storm.

Raslanas said residents had helped clear roads and cut up fallen trees, while national authorities had reacted too slowly. He also called for better targeting of civil protection funding, with priority given to generators.

During the storm, generators kept water and wastewater services operating in Kupiškis, he said. Four generators were moved between locations according to a schedule, but he added that many more were needed. The Energy Distribution Operator had 200 generators in the Panevėžys region, 30 of which failed immediately because they had not been tested, according to the mayor.

The weekend storm killed one person, injured four others and disrupted electricity supplies to more than 268,000 customers, BNS reported. As of Thursday morning, 62,000 customers remained without power. The government declared a state-level emergency on Wednesday because of the storm and the heavy losses suffered by farmers.