Snowfalls paralysed most of the country on the first working day of 2008. For yet another year the biggest and richest Bulgarian city, Sofia, was among the worst “victims” of the winter.

Snow started to fall in Sofia at about 5pm on January 1 and it took just a few hours for the city to become completely blocked. As had been predicted the main routes into the city quickly became jammed as people returned from their Christmas and New Year's holidays. Those entering the city on the Trakia Highway (Sofia-Plovdiv route) met a Tsarigradsko Chausse that obviously had not been cleared of snow, despite the weather forecast for heavy snowfall announced a day earlier. The situation on the other major road, the Hemus Highway (Sofia-Varna route) was similar.

The two highways were, however, relatively safe for use as the vehicles travelling them were “clearing” most of the snow. On the other hand, side streets were, in most cases, a dead end for anything less than a 4x4 vehicle.

The snow did not stop for the entire night and continued into January 2. With more than 600 000 Sofians back and ready to go to work and school the city was looking at a yet another snow crisis. Major roads were usable again only because of the amount of traffic churning up the now muddy brown snow. There was little sign that any snow-clearing vehicles had been dispatched by the authorities.

Side streets remained a challenge, as did parking. Where a street had been cleared by a snowplough, the mounds of snow left behind it piled up on the pavement, made parking impossible. Some ambitious drivers used whatever they could grab to dig themselves a place to park.

According to Sofia municipality public transport was running on schedule and Sofians were urged to leave their vehicles at home using the public transport network. Many did just that, if only to see some of the buses struggling along the still blocked streets. Calling a taxi, which has long become a mission impossible in rush hour, was even harder in the snow.

With all this snowy drama questions were asked of the authorities who are suppose to keep the city functioning despite such winter “surprises” as snowfalls.

Sofia municipality said that 250 snow clearing vehicles were sent out onto the streets to fight the snow as of 5pm on January 1. On January 2 the municipality said in a media statement that a total of 190 heavy vehicles were in operation.

As an additional guarantee the municipality said that as of 3am Sofia mayor Boiko Borissov personally took on overseeing the work of the snowploughs, making sure that everything was done properly. It took Borissov eight hours to make his first discovery.

The concessionaires in charge of cleaning the streets were caught lying by Borissov. Concessionaires claimed they had 250 vehicles on the streets while the police counted no more than 40 vehicles, Borissov told reporters. “They will not be paid the entire sum because of that,” he said.

According to Galen Ganchev, head of Sofia municipality’s inspectorate, the long and heavy snowfall was the main reason for the difficulties Sofians had to go through.

Some reports however revealed that there was something else hidden under the snow. Regular reports by Bulgarian-language Focus news agency on the night of January 1 said that most of the snow-clearing vehicles were indeed on streets but the vehicles were being driven without the snowploughs being used. The drivers said, as quoted by Focus, that there was a complete lack of organisation and they were not told which streets to clean, which resulted in them simply driving around. Another problem was the parked vehicles that made it difficult for the clearing equipment to enter the side streets. Ambulances and fire engines also found it impossible to use some of Sofia’s streets.

Again according to Focus some of the drivers called out to clean the streets complained about the late hour they were sent out and said they would not use the snowploughs but just throw salt and sand on the streets. The official stance from concessionaires was that throwing these mixtures onto the streets instead of using snowploughs was part of a new modern method of clearing the snow. Borissov said that he had asked the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences to investigate which method was more effective.

As was the case last year, a debate about who was responsible for clearing the highway entrances and remote Sofia neighbourhoods emerged. The “discussion” was again between Sofia municipality and the state National Infrastructure Fund.

This mostly affected the neighbourhoods of Simeonovo, Dragalevtsi and Boyana, which traditionally get more snow because they are higher up, in the foothills of Vitosha Mountain.

Famous for its winter problems, Sofia Airport did not disappoint and on January 2 cancelled most flights. This time however it had nothing to do with airport’s conditions since the decision was taken by the air carriers and not by the airport, a statement from Sofia Airport said. Plovdiv Airport was also closed for the day as were all the seaports along the Black Sea.

Getting in and out of Sofia was also a problem on January 2. Both highways were jammed with vehicles. Again little was done to clear the roads and lorries dominated the scenery adding to the general confusion.

The situation on the roads around the country was similar to that in Sofia. As it happens every winter several mountain passes were closed because of the snow. On January 2 Shipka Pass, connecting Gabrovo with Kazanluk, was closed. About 52 towns and villages were left without electricity in the regions of Montana, Plovdiv and Pazardjik but no emergency situations were reported.

Skiers were happy as more than enough snow fell in winter resorts but people were advised to restrain from using the slopes on January 2.