Rising Floodwaters Leave Europe Bracing for More Destruction
(Bloomberg) -- Deadly floods unleashed destruction across central Europe, with water levels on the River Danube rising further.
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The torrential rain from Storm Boris is set to subside on Tuesday but water levels remain elevated across the region. In Austria, the focus is turning to the threat posed by melting snow and landslides, after the slow-moving cold weather system brought heavy falls to the Alps.
A rescue mission with helicopters and search dogs is under way after several people were swept away by an avalanche on a hiking trail near Huettschlag in central Austria on Tuesday afternoon, according to the Salzburger Nachrichten newspaper. A warning of elevated avalanche risks was issued almost three months before regular reporting starts after as much as 150 centimeters (59 inches) of snow fell in the past week.
The heat waves that seared the Mediterranean this summer — raising sea temperatures to record levels — are helping to turbo charge storms across Europe. It’s another sign that climate change is increasing the intensity and frequency of extreme weather events.
“Storm Boris is a stark reminder that the boundaries of what we consider ‘extreme’ weather are shifting rapidly due to human-induced climate change,” said Bucharest University’s Bogdan Antonescu, one of the scientists at ClimaMeter, a project funded by the EU and French National Centre for Scientific Research.
As the floods leave a trail of destruction in central Europe, Portugal and Greece are still battling wildfires. There have been about 4,500 blazes this season, with the combination fire and meteorological conditions being the worst in the past 40 years, according to Greek Civil Protection Minister Vasilis Kikilias.
Just as Greece has improved its response to this year’s fires, central Europe has been better prepared for the floods than 27 years ago, according to Erste Group Bank AG. In addition to accurate forecasting, countries such as Poland and the Czech Republic have invested in flood control systems and retention reservoirs, reducing the economic impact.
Still, the floods have triggered emergency measures in Austria, the Czech Republic and Romania, after thousands of people were evacuated. The intensity of the weekend rainfall was likely to happen once every 100 to 120 years, according to Romania’s Water Management Authority.
Czech authorities are monitoring the risk to the northern city of Ostrava, along with southern parts of the country, while red flood alerts are in place for Hungary and Slovakia. In Poland, the nation’s third-largest city Wroclaw may be threatened later this week by the swollen rivers.
While floodwaters are receding in most of the Czech Republic on Tuesday, many roads and railway lines in the country’s east remain closed for safety inspections and repairs. Some damaged bridges will need to be torn down. The association of Czech insurance companies has estimated insured damages across the country at 17 billion koruna ($753 million).
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said his will outline a reconstruction plan once the floodwaters subside, using both state funds and some of the €1.5 billion ($1.7 billion) made available by the European Union for impacted countries.
Referencing the flooding and the wildfires in Portugal, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said financing and managing such events will be of growing importance.
“We will have to sit down also with the affected countries with the floodings and discuss how we can support them in repair and reconstruction,” she told reporters on Tuesday.
The flooding has led to widespread disruption of transport services, while power supplies to many towns and villages were temporarily cut. At least 19 people have been killed across the region.
Tusk said the floods in the neighboring Czech Republic are due to move into southern Poland, threatening Wroclaw, a city of more than 600,000 that was badly hit by floods in 1997. While the greatest risk will come later in the week, one neighborhood may be hit by a wave on Tuesday, after the uncoordinated release of water from a nearby reservoir by utility Tauron Polska Energia SA.
Elsewhere in Poland, 44,000 residents in the southwestern city of Nysa were told to evacuate amid concern that a lake embankment could breach. Soldiers have joined efforts to shore up flood defenses in both Wroclaw and Nysa.
Austria announced a fifth flood death, while authorities continued evacuations overnight in nine towns across Lower Austria, where there were 21 cases of dams breaking on Monday. Firefighters have attended to 15,000 calls in the province.
Rail traffic on Austria’s key corridor between Vienna and Salzburg remains closed on large sections. In the capital, four out of five underground lines are running partial services, but normal operations could resume from Wednesday.
Bavarian authorities reported rising water levels on the Danube at Passau, a border town between Austria and Germany that’s also the confluence of the river with the Inn and Ilz tributaries.
In Hungary, the banks of the Danube in Budapest were closed to traffic and so was Margitsziget, the island where residents go for a run or a swim. Volunteers joined the army in working all night to pack sandbags along the river, as the nation expected the highest water levels in more than a decade.
--With assistance from Irina Vilcu, Andras Gergely, Joao Lima, Maciej Martewicz, Piotr Skolimowski, Wojciech Moskwa, Zoltan Simon, Paul Tugwell, Thomas Hall, John Ainger and Eamon Akil Farhat.
(Updates with avalanche in Austria in third paragraph)
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