The construction of shelters has been considered too expensive and Soviet-era shelters have deteriorated. According to the Rescue Agency, citizens’ preparedness skills have also been deficient.
TALLINN We enter the basement of a medium-sized apartment building in the Männiku area of the Estonian capital.
A damp musty scent spreads through the nose. The labyrinthine basement has small booths for each apartment. Their doors are assembled from different boards.
There is room for a few bigger spaces. They open to street-level windows.
Chairman of a housing association Raivo Konnapere does not seek to beautify the situation.
– At the start of the firing in this basement should not be, he notes in the light of events in Kiev.
The 80-apartment apartment building was built in the mid-1980s. According to Konnaper, prison labor was also used for the construction work.
In an extreme emergency, the basement could be sheltered for up to a few hours.
– There is no proper ventilation or water supply here. Only the sewer pipes run through the walls.
Besides, there is not enough space.
If all the basement facilities were taken into use, the residents of the 80-apartment house would be able to accommodate even a small amount of space.
– It would be really cramped, Konnapere shakes his head.
There are no civil protection regulations for basements
Tartu, the second largest city in Estonia, has a population of 96,000, but its real population is increasing.
The majority of the population lives in Soviet-era apartment buildings. The construction quality of precast concrete houses varies.
Three years ago, the suitability of the basements of apartment buildings as shelters was analyzed in Estonia.
– It turned out that there would be some protection from them, says the head of the emergency department of the Estonian Rescue Board Wind Herring Ylelle.
However, as the example of Männikku shows, it is not possible to stay in the basements for longer periods.
– There are no civil protection requirements for basements, even in new or new apartment buildings, Räim admits.
There is no obligation to build a basement in detached houses at all. Many have left it out for cost reasons.
The decision to abandon general civil protection took place in Estonia in the early 1990s. Building shelters like in Finland would have been very expensive.
For this reason, the 2019 report also did not recommend the construction of public shelters.
Soviet-era shelters, on the other hand, are dilapidated and out of order.
– The starting point is that in the event of an air attack, people would seek out existing basements, underground car parks, tunnels or other similar facilities, Räim says.
However, they are not the same huge caves dug into the bedrock as in Finland. They are also not marked as civil shelters and no water supply, toilets, washing and the like have been planned.
At the beginning of this year, it was decided to invest an additional EUR 380 million in national defense in Estonia. Some of the money also went to the rescue agency.
However, there is not enough money to renovate the premises suitable for civil protection. According to an estimate for 2019, it would require about six million euros.
The coronary pandemic taught the importance of home assets
According to Tuuli Räim, there is also room for improvement in the readiness of Estonians. The Rescue Agency examines citizens’ preparedness for crises every year.
– About 15 percent are really well prepared. The other 15 percent don’t care about that heavenly one, says Räim.
The remaining 70 percent, he says, can be raised for crisis preparedness with the right education.
Last year, the Rescue Board sent an information pack to all Estonian households about what it takes to get a family on their own for a week.
However, the issue of civil protection is not solved by a factsheet alone.
Our example house in Männiku is soon to be renovated. Raivo Konnapere says that the condition assessment and the repair plan also aim to take civil protection into account.
Even this time, money may prove to be a stick in a stroller.
– Not all homeowners want to pay anything extra, Konnapere says.