Flooding in Russia Prompts Grass-Roots Aid Response Russia's summers are brief affairs, memorable less for their respite from winter's chill than for the tragedies that almost inevitably occur. A few summers ago, fire and heat scorched broad swaths of Russia, destroying whole villages and killing scores. Some summers have brought plane crashes. One summer saw a coup and another a war. This year will be remembered as the summer of the floods. As my colleague Ellen Barry writes, the death count in flooding in southern Russia over the weekend has surpassed 170 people, and rescue workers have not yet finished digging through the layers of muck and debris left behind. Officials have acknowledged they were aware of the dangers posed by rising waters, but failed to deliver that information to the residents of Krymsk, the city of 57,000 devastated by the flood. It is perhaps not surprising then that anger has been directed at officials, particularly President Vladimir V. Putin, whose aggressive consolidation of power has left him exposed to blame when tragedy strikes. The government's response was also not unexpected. As in previous tragedies, local officials lost their jobs and financial compensation was promised to the victims. Mr. Putin, characteristically, toured the damaged regions by helicopter. Yet growing pleas for help from local residents have prompted an uncharacteristic response: a grass-roots aid effort spearheaded by young activists mostly in Moscow. Tapping into social networks stitched together online and in the streets during winter's wave of anti-Kremlin protests, opposition leaders and civic activists have been gathering food, water and medical supplies for victims of the flood and traveling to affected areas to help with the cleanup. Moreover, some opposition leaders have called on their followers to put politics aside and work with erstwhile opponents from pro-Kremlin groups, some of which were also organizing relief efforts. "We are not going there for PR or to score political points, but simply to help," Ilya Ponomaryov, a member of Parliament and an opposition leader, wrote on his blog. In one video, volunteers in Moscow are shown loading trucks with water, shovels, blankets and women's shoes among other items. Activists are later shown holding signs that read, "Krymsk, we are with you." Rarely in Russia have such disasters prompted much of a public response. Since the Soviet collapse, Russians have been generally slow in taking up charitable activities and volunteer work. The broad upheavals of recent decades have made it hard enough for people to look out for themselves and their loved ones. The response to the recent flooding suggests that this might be changing. Even government officials seem impressed. "I've seen the work of volunteers," Aleksandr Tkachev, the governor of the region hardest hit by the flooding, posted on Twitter. Guys are coming to Krymsk from around the Kuban, from around the country. They're bringing humanitarian aid, doing great work.