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GAMEPLAY GAME
The capital city hall has mastered the ability to avoid unpleasant issues a long time ago, and to perfection. Once again, this was confirmed by our attempts to find out what kind of drugs are used in Moscow, why they are purchased, in what quantity and who is responsible for it. Polite officials skillfully redirect journalists from one phone number to another, from department to department, asking them to send official letters, wait a few days for an answer … And so it can go on forever. In anticipation, we examined several official documents regarding the fight against ice in the capital. Where did they get a lot of interesting information.
For example, according to the Moscow instruction, winter lasts from 165 to 166 days a year, and specifically from November 1 to April 15. Moreover, within three hours from the beginning of the snowfall, all roads should be treated with anti-icing reagents (PGR), and the Moscow Ring Road, the main highways and interchanges - generally within an hour, in order to ensure "the coefficient of adhesion of wheels of vehicles with road surfaces in accordance with the requirements of GOST R 50597–93.” And this, in turn, should guarantee "safe traffic conditions at a speed permitted by traffic rules". Road processing should be carried out “mainly in the morning or evening hours, with a wind speed of not more than 5.4 m / s and a relative humidity of 40–80%”.
There was not only the main thing - the selection criteria for a particular drug. As a rule, we were sent to the results of various tenders, during which the procurement decision is made.
A steel nut met a new drug
A steel nut met a new drug. A steel nut met a new drug.
She’s better in salt water
She’s better in salt water! She’s better in salt water!
AND JUDGES WHO?
The choice of anti-icing preparations in Russia and in the world is not too large: these are salts (potassium, sodium, magnesium, in solid or liquid form) with a small addition of additives, as well as sand, granite chips, etc. Everything has long been known and verified, the difference only in proportions. Local authorities themselves choose at tenders suppliers who are entitled to put forward their requirements. By the way, a certificate for PGR can be obtained in many laboratories where they are engaged in both chemical and physical tests (in particular, they measure the slip coefficient), but it is not mandatory! And slip measurements in real conditions of the landfill according to Russian GOSTs are not carried out at all. Therefore, apparently, from time immemorial, only sand and salt have been used on federal roads, and salt is scattered both before and after snowfall.
In Moscow, from last year, they decided to go their own way. For example, the number of purchased PGRs sharply increased (up to 260 thousand tons of liquid and up to 200 thousand tons of solid per year). Moreover, solid reagents based on sodium chloride, containing up to 20% of various additives (calcium chloride, sodium formate and potassium chloride), were widely used for the first time.
Such drugs are now under the column "Innovative bio-PGR." And the manufacturer of this good advertises its products in this way: “Melts ice - fertilizes the soil.”
Maybe that’s how it will be - from magical additives in the spring grass and bushes of unprecedented beauty will bloom along Moscow roads … We don’t know. The fact, however, is that new drugs are much more expensive than old, proven ones. This is the price of progress, which is costly. And the recommended number of treatments with solid PGR is also sharply increased - from 30 to 70 or more.
Since last year, in Moscow for the first time in many years, it was also allowed to use PGR not only on the roadway, but also on all sidewalks, in yards and pedestrian zones. To do this, they bought 45 thousand tons of mixtures - of course, “innovative” ones. How they will interact with our shoes and dog paws is still unknown. Muscovites' complaints about this do not subside.
Experimental cacti before and after exploring the PGR
Experimental cacti before and after exploring the PGR. Experimental cacti before and after exploring the PGR.
So fertilizes so fertilizes …
Already fertilizes so fertilizes … Already fertilizes so fertilizes …
OUR EXPERIMENTS
Therefore, at the end of last winter, we decided to conduct a number of scientific experiments. To do this, they bought a bag with the drug BIONORD of the Ural Plant of Deicing Materials.
There were several topics:
- evaluate the coefficients of friction on the road surface - before and after;
- conduct an express analysis of the effect of miracle powder on metal;
- “feed” the experimental plant (cactus) and compare it with ordinary counterparts in flower pots.
The camera captured the results. The condition of the three cacti “before and after” does not need comments: the reader, I suppose, will guess which of the three thorns we watered with Bionord for a couple of weeks. The metal reacted even faster. Two absolutely identical nuts were immersed in solutions - in the first was salt, borrowed from the editorial buffet, in the second - a travel potion. Results after five days of exposure - in the photo! The nut did not react to table salt at all, but her friend was clearly out of luck!
As for friction, according to the dictates of the time, it was necessary to manufacture "special equipment using nanotechnology." From the sacrificed tire they built a kind of slide, put their favorite editorial weight in them, then hitched a dynamometer and went outside to evaluate friction. It turned out funny. Each passing driver invertedly turned his neck, trying to guess what these eccentrics with weights, sleds and cameras were doing.
Measurement equipment: dynamometer, a piece of tire and weight
Measurement equipment: dynamometer, a piece of tire and weight. Measurement equipment: dynamometer, a piece of tire and weight.
Yes, primitive, but no one has denied the results
Yes, primitive, but no one has denied the results! Yes, primitive, but no one has denied the results!
But with what! On compacted dense snow, a sled with a pond weight required an effort of about 5 kg. The same stretch of road, treated by Bionord, was transformed into asphalt a few minutes later - the force jumped to 8–9 kg! But after another half hour, the fruits of labor turned into a slippery liquid slurry - and the slide began to move with an effort of only 2-3 kg!
Which, in fact, was expected. The friction coefficient on the treated asphalt at some point becomes less than on rolled snow. But if the driver is mentally prepared for the snow and drives the car accordingly, the sight of “clean asphalt” misleads him and makes him drive like in summer. Results? And they are in the accident reports … The editors in no way claim to be the absolute scientific objectivity of our experiment, conducted in the yard with the help of improvised means. But still he makes a number of conclusions.
First: still a dark forest - everything related to urban procurement. Both under the former mayor and the current one, officials are not at all eager to explain why they are purchasing certain drugs, which, of course, gives rise to monstrous rumors - both about their (drugs) danger to the health of people and plants, and about corruption associated with procurement.
Second: it seems to us that some “side effects” of new drugs are poorly understood. In any case, no one in the field conditions investigated the behavior of the car after processing the pavement with these reagents. But in vain!
