Dams full, dikes fragile - Flood situation remains tense - Dresden declares alert level three
Hundreds of people had to leave their homes and apartments over the Christmas holidays due to flooding - and swelling watercourses and overflowing reservoirs could force others to flee. The situation will remain tense over the next few days, warned the authorities in Lower Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt, among others, on Tuesday. The weather forecast offers some hope: According to the forecast of the German Weather Service (DWD), there should be some rain in the northwest on Wednesday, but otherwise it should remain dry with some major clearing in places.
Alert level three in Dresden
Dresden has declared a level 3 alert for the Elbe due to the flooding. On Wednesday morning between 6 a.m. and 9 a.m., the guideline value of alert level 2 was expected to be exceeded at the Dresden-Augustusbrücke gauge, the city announced on Tuesday evening. The Dresden Environmental Agency had therefore decided to declare an alert level 3 for the Elbe in Dresden on Tuesday evening. This was justified as, according to the forecasts, the guideline value for alert level 3 had definitely been reached and a further rise was to be expected.
After days of continuous rain, the flood situation in many regions of Germany had worsened over the holidays. In Saxony-Anhalt, around 180 residents of the village of Thürungen were urged on Tuesday to seek safety due to the threat of flooding at the Kelbra reservoir and the Helme river. In other places in the region, residents were told to prepare for possible evacuations. The extent of possible flooding is difficult to predict, according to a spokeswoman for the Mansfeld-Südharz district.
Hundreds of people in Rinteln in Lower Saxony and Windehausen in Thuringia also had to leave their houses and apartments due to flooding over the Christmas holidays. As here, rivers bursting their banks in other federal states transformed the surrounding area into extensive water landscapes.
Flood warning in Windehausen
In Windehausen, Thuringia, the situation had eased considerably on Tuesday, according to a police spokesperson early on Wednesday morning. The water levels in Thuringia had largely receded. Soaked dams broke in Northeim in southern Lower Saxony and Uplengen in the Leer district. Helpers were in constant action to secure the damaged bulwarks with sandbags.
While the situation began to ease regionally as the rainfall subsided, the most critical situation was yet to come in other areas. For example, the highest water levels of a flood wave on the Elbe were not expected until Wednesday. This was due to the melting snow and heavy rainfall in the Giant Mountains, it was said.
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Source: www.stern.de
