By Alissa de Carbonnel

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Irate holidaymakers beat up Aeroflot staff at a Moscow airport on Tuesday as thousands were stranded with little food or information, after icy rain and blackouts disrupted traffic for a third straight day.
At Sheremetyevo where Russia’s flagship carrier is based, Aeroflot personnel were now scared of dealing with agitated passengers, saying the airport did not have enough security guards, state-run RIA quoted an airline employee as saying.
Police told Reuters they were not involved in the reported violence at Sheremetyevo and declined to comment.
On Monday a group of passengers stormed passport control at Moscow’s Domodedovo, Russia’s biggest airport, where OMON riot police have since been dispatched.
“People are desperate. Fights have broken out. It feels like there is no air in here,” one woman at Domodedovo told Vesti 24 television on Tuesday.
Russia’s transport minister issued blistering criticism of the management of the country’s largest airport, Domodedovo, saying it should have shut because of the power cuts instead of keeping passengers hostage waiting for their flights.
“Here is a question for the airport’s management — why did they keep receiving passengers?” Igor Levitin was quoted by the Itar-Tass news agency as saying.
“After the lights went out, they should have shut!”
Prosecutors launched a probe on Tuesday into the widespread delays at the Russian capital’s two main airports.
Only 150 flights took off overnight at Domodedovo, which typically runs some 700 flights a day, after freezing rain snapped power lines leaving it in the dark for more than 10 hours over the weekend.
Arrival and departure information boards were almost all red, warning of delays and cancellations as passengers slept on baggage conveyor belts and departure hall floors.
Russia’s aviation agency chief Alexander Neradko said in televised comments that it would take another two to three days to normalise transport at Domodedovo and that priority was being given to passengers stuck since Sunday.
Shortages of de-icing fluid at Moscow’s second airport, Sheremetyevo, grounded about half its flights.
Other Moscow airports have also seen traffic severely cut after freezing rain coated the city in a thick sheet of ice, and health officials advised Russians to stay at home. Heavy snow and sub-zero temperatures are typical fare for Moscow’s airports but the weekend downpour of freezing rain was unusual.
The Russian Tourism Association said some 20,000 passengers have had their flights delayed, though airport authorities say the number is in the low thousands.
Exasperated passengers told Ekho Moskvye radio that restaurants had hiked their prices, with bottles of water selling for up to 500 roubles ($16).
Domodedovo handled nearly 19 million passengers last year, while Sheremetyevo handled almost 15 million. Domodedovo plans a stock market flotation in 2011 and could raise up to $1 billion (645 million pounds), financial sources told Reuters in November.
(Editing by Louise Ireland)

Maslenitsa (Pancake week) is the only purely Russian Holiday that dates back to the pagan times. For seven days Moscow jingles with bells, sings with garmoshkas and glares with gaily-painted dresses. The people are letting the long-annoying winter out and the long-awaited spring in.

The counters in the Maslenitsa town are groaning with various dainties. There are the paunchy samovars with mellow tea, bunches of sweet-scented barankas, nuts and honey pies with different signs: “Whom I love - to those I give”, “A present of the sweet-hart is the dearest”. Salted foods, various fish, caviar - choose and eat anything however much you like!

But the essential elements, of course, are pancakes (blini). Pankacke is a symbol of sun. It is as round, gold and warm as the sun. Pancakes are served hot with either butter, or sour cream, or caviar, or mushrooms, or sturgeon - to any exquisite taste.

Where else can you take a horse-drawn sledge ride that will take your breath away? Or take a jaunty slip down an enormous ice slope? Or go round on a giant carousel? The Great Maslenitsa will reel you round in a dancing fairy-circle and your feet won’t be able to keep still to the sprightly chastooshkas (gaily songs) and byword. Clowns and skomorokhs (histrions) will make you laugh to tears. The show goes on and on in the balagans (Punch-and-Judy shows) and theatres. And those who will not want to be simply a spectator can take part in the masquerade: to dress up beyond recognition or to muffle in a long fur coat and to drink a glass of vodka with a bear.

On the last day of the Great Maslenitsa the feasting and drinking ends up by burning down the scarecrow symbolizing winter thus saying goodbye to winter till the next year.

For the Russians Maslenitsa is like a carnival for the Italians, especially because the initial sense of festivals is the same: the Italian word “carnival” (carne-vale) means “farewell the beef!”, and Maslenitsa that precedes the Great Lent, in old time was called “Myasopust” because it was forbidden to eat meat during this week.

The last day of Maslenitsa is called the Forgiveness Day. Everybody ask one another for forgiveness in order to redeem themselves from their sins before the Great Lent. They bow to one another and say, “God will forgive you”. Maslenitsa is over and so is the winter giving way to the spring.

Everybody knows what the Russian Soul is! This is prowess, dare-devilry, and, of course, the famous Russian hospitality. Everybody is welcome to Moscow to see the Russian winter off!

For the ninth time in the heart of Moscow the Maslenitsa Town will unfold, and once again on the Vasilievskiy spusk joyful songs will be heard, traditional dances will flow, circus tents and pubs will open and competitions and challenges with various prizes and presents will start. The celebration will be taken outside to the streets of Moscow and anyone willing will be able to join the carnival procession. You can find out the what, where and when of the Maslenitsa week in the Celebration Program here.

Come to our Great “Shirokaya Maslenitsa” celebration and let this festival bring you joy. Let it help you forget about everyday routine, let the Russian ways help you unwind. The Maslenitsa Festival is the best chance to see and try them all! Where else, if not then, during the Maslenitsa Festival, to relax, say goodbye to winter and greet the coming spring! This is just the right time to enjoy life to the fullest, the right time to, Have Fun!

DiscoverRus Travel Club and Russian Railway Tours exclusively present Trans-Siberian Voyage via private train “Alexander Nevsky”. Undisputedly the world’s greatest railway journey, the Trans-Siberian Railway runs from Moscow over the Urals, across the magnificent Russian steppes and alongside the shores of the world’s largest freshwater lake. Through the territory of Soviet Russia and the land of the Tatars, across the Steppes and on to China and Japan, the Trans-Siberian express takes from nine to ten days to complete its journey. Russia’s Trans-Siberian Railway is the longest continuous rail line on Earth, that runs in an epic journey of almost six thousand miles over one third of the globe. The Trans-Siberian line runs from Moscow to Vladivostok, passing through Yaroslavl on the Volga, Yekaterinburg in the Urals, Irkutsk near scenic Lake Baikal’s southern extremity, and then Khabarovsk. Just sit back andenjoy the trip!