A plague of locusts in Russia's Dagestan

They consume food of 10 elephants or 2,500 people and can travel up to 130km in one day. Biblical plague of locusts hit Dagestan Russia

The Big Wobble,
20 July, 2017



Spine-tingling footage shows a swarm of locusts traveling across a road in the southern Russian republic of Dagestan, where swaths of land have been infested by the plague.

The amateur video, filmed through the windscreen of a moving car, shows what at first seems to be a sandstorm looming on the horizon.

However, as the car approaches, the dense cloud turns out to be a chaotic mass of giant bugs making their way across the road.

The infestation of locusts prompted local authorities to declare a state of emergency in parts of the republic last month, with some 114,000 hectares of agricultural land affected.

Despite measures being taken, such as fumigation from tractors and planes, the locusts have been eating their way through the republic's farmland since early summer, destroying crops and grazing. "They devour everything.

They destroy green fields and there is nothing, just bare ground.

There are the greens over there, which they have not yet reached," a local resident told Ruptly video agency.

"It makes no difference for them: trees, shrubs or grass.

If they devour it all, the cattle will have nowhere to graze.

We would not know what to do then."

According to the UN's Agriculture and Food Organization, an average swarm of locusts can consume the same amount of food as 10 elephants or 2,500 people, as well as being able to travel distances of up to 130km in one day.

Meanwhile there is a very good denier in the Kremlin

Climate change offers chance of major economic boost in Arctic for Russia,says Putin

Besides, it is impossible to halt global warming which has been underway for many decades, insists the president.

The combination of technological advance and climate change will see a major economic boost to Russia from the Arctic in the years ahead, said Vladimir Putin.

He spoke on the opportunities of the Northern Sea Route and energy developments after a visit to an ice cave in the remote polar outpost of Alexandra Land, only some 900 kilometres from the North Pole.

'Today we took the first tanker in the newly constructed port of Sabetta,' he said at an Arctic development forum in Arkangelsk. 'An absolutely new port, built from scratch in the Arctic zone, in an open field, as they say. Until recently, it would have been difficult to do this with such quality.

'The ship that came to this port today is modern technology, it breaks the ice, itself, like an icebreaker, goes through two metre thick. This is about new technologies.