These tunnel crashes are linked to an anti-icer sprayed over Moscow streets this winter. This thing makes every surface it touches slippery like hell. Moscow city council decided to cancel using tis stuff, due to high accident rate for both cars and pedestrians (especially in the Metro, where pedestriants slip on granite and marble floors). All that was widely discussed in local media.
However it does not fit your: "rusty Lada, worn tyres, half-drunken speeding drivers". I trust you have never been to Moscow, otherwise you would have known, that most drivers in the winter would change their tyres - the first day the snow falls you would see long queues at the tyre centers. And you possibly never been to France or Portugal, speaking of regard for traffic regulations.
"These tunnel crashes are linked to an anti-icer sprayed over Moscow streets this winter."
So why the accidents in a tunnel?
Is Moscow so different that it snows in tunnels?
And why can't Putin apologists get the story straight? Garyspfc would have us believe it is the ice, not the deicer.
Admit it - Russian drivers are the worst in Europe. The fatality rate for car accidents is THREE times as high as the rest of Europe.
http://english.people.com.cn/200307/03/eng20030703_119368.shtml