An ice-cream van stuck in melted asphalt on a Moscow street this week during the hottest five days in the city’s recorded history, freakish weather that triggered minor power failures, caused sunstrokes and led to a spate of drownings.

A persistent spell of extreme cold has caused more deaths among Russians stranded on frigid streets but failed to freeze the spirits of thousands who plunged into ice water for an annual ritual marking a Russian Orthodox Christian holiday.