Snow causes traffic chaos in Bulgaria

Heavy snowfall and strong winds caused havoc on roads across Bulgaria on Tuesday, road officials and rescue services said.

SOFIA, March 9, 2010 (AFP) - Heavy snowfall and strong winds caused havoc on roads across Bulgaria on Tuesday, road officials and rescue services said.

Snowstorms completely cut off access to three small municipalities near Varna on the Black Sea, prompting local authorities to declare a state of emergency for a second time this year, the rescue services said.

Heavy winds and snowdrifts left dozens of villages in the northeastern region of Dobrich without electricity.

A major road linking the capital Sofia to the northern city of Ruse and the country's only bridge over the Danube to Romania were intermittently closed and traffic on two major highways between Sofia and the Black Sea cities of Varna and Burgas was also brought to a standstill.

The mountainous Zlatograd-Ksanti border crossing with Greece was also shut.

Traffic in the capital Sofia has been severely disrupted since the snowfall began early Monday, with commuters complaining it can take them as long as five hours to travel from the outer neighbourhoods to the city centre.