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 By Jean-Philippe LACOUR with Femke COLBORNE in Berlin Schuld, Germany (AFP) July 16, 2021
The death toll from devastating floods in Europe soared to at least 126 on Friday, most in western Germany where emergency responders were frantically searching for missing people. Unsuspecting residents were caught completely off guard by the torrent dubbed the "flood of death" by Germany's top-selling daily Bild. Streets and houses were submerged by water in some areas, while cars were left overturned on soaked streets after flood waters passed. Some districts were completely cut off from the outside world. "Everything was under water within 15 minutes," Agron Berischa, a 21-year-old decorator from Bad Neuenahr in Rhineland-Palatinate state, told AFP. "Our flat, our office, our neighbours' houses, everywhere was under water." Residents were shocked by the damage as floodwaters continued to rise overnight. "We rushed home and found ourselves waist-deep in water. And overnight another 50 centimetres were added," said Christoph Buecken in Eschweiler in North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW). Adding to the devastation, several more people were feared dead in a landslide in northern Germany on Friday triggered by floods. Hundreds were unaccounted for in the country, while the death toll in Belgium jumped to 23 with more than 21,000 people left without electricity in one region. Luxembourg and the Netherlands were also hammered by heavy rains, inundating many areas and forcing thousands to be evacuated in the city of Maastricht. - Fearing the worst - In Germany's hard-hit Ahrweiler district in Rhineland-Palatinate, several houses collapsed completely, drawing comparisons to the aftermath of a tsunami. At least 24 people were confirmed dead in Euskirchen, one of the worst-affected towns just to the north. "I fear that we will only see the full extent of the disaster in the coming days," Chancellor Angela Merkel said late Thursday from Washington, where she met with President Joe Biden. "My empathy and my heart go out to all of those who in this catastrophe lost their loved ones, or who are still worrying about the fate of people still missing." The number of casualties in Rhineland-Palatinate has reached 60, bringing the national toll to at least 103, authorities said Friday. In Ahrweiler, around 1,300 people were unaccounted for, although local authorities told Bild the high number was likely due to damaged phone networks. Regional interior minister Roger Lewentz told local media that up to 60 people were believed to be missing, "and when you haven't heard from people for such a long time... you have to fear the worst". "The number of victims will likely keep rising in the coming days," he added. - Billions in damage - Several people were dead and missing after a landslide in Erftstadt-Blessem in NRW, local officials said Friday. "Houses were largely swept away by the water and some collapsed," the Cologne local authority said on Twitter, while a spokeswoman for the local government told AFP there were "confirmed" deaths. Gerd Landsberg, head of the German Association of Towns and Municipalities, said the cost of the damage was likely to run into "billions of euros". In Belgium, the army has been sent to four of the country's 10 provinces to help with rescue and evacuations. The swollen Meuse river "is going to look very dangerous for Liege", a nearby city of 200,000 people, warned Wallonia regional president Elio Di Rupo. In Switzerland, lakes and rivers were also swelling after heavy overnight rainfall. In Lucerne in particular, Lake Lucerne had begun to flood the city centre. Some parts of western Europe received up to two months' worth of rainfall in two days on soil that was already near saturation, according to the World Meteorological Organization. - Climate change? - The severe storms have put climate change back at the centre of Germany's election campaign ahead of a September 26 poll marking the end of Merkel's 16 years in power. Speaking in Berlin on Friday, President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said Germany would "only be able to curb extreme weather situations if we engage in a determined fight against climate change". The country "must prepare much better" in future, Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said, adding that "this extreme weather is a consequence of climate change". Because a warmer atmosphere holds more water, climate change increases the risk and intensity of flooding from extreme rainfall. In urban areas with poor drainage and buildings located in flood zones, the damage can be severe. North Rhine-Westphalia premier Armin Laschet, the conservative running to succeed Merkel, called for "speeding up" global efforts to fight climate change, underlining the link between global warming and extreme weather.
Belgium asks residents to quit Liege's flood-threatened riverfront The city authorities "ask the inhabitants of Liege who still have the possibility to evacuate to do so," a statement said, adding that waters could rise another 1.5 metres (five feet) in the coming hours from their current levels. "If evacuation is no longer possible, citizens are advised to go upstairs and not to take any risks," the statement added. "The crisis situation is exceptional and solidarity must prevail," they said. The Meuse, or Maas in Dutch, is one of northwestern Europe's major waterways with streams and tributaries flowing down from much of southern Belgium, including the hilly Ardennes region. These rivers, in particular the Ourthe and the Vesdre, have seen their flow increase enormously with the torrential rains of recent days. Liege, with a population of around 200,000, is the fourth most populous city in Belgium and is just 40 kilometres (24 miles) from Germany, where the floods have killed at least 42 people. "The flooding is going to be very dangerous in Liege itself," the president of the Walloon region. Elio Di Rupo, told the regional parliament on Thursday. The towns bordering these rivers in the regions of Liege and Verviers have been under water since Wednesday, notably Theux, Pepinster and the spa town of Spa. According to the Belgian media, at least six people died in the country as a result of the floods, including four in the eastern district of Verviers alone. Thousands of people may have to be relocated.
'It's crazy': Germany's Mayen town hit by flash floods "Nobody was expecting this -- where did all this rain come from? It's crazy," said pensioner Annemarie Mueller, 65, looking over her flooded garden and garage from her balcony. "It made such a loud noise and given how fast it came down we thought it would break the door down," she said. The small town is some 40 kilometres (25 miles) south of Ahrweiler in the volcanic Eifel region, the hardest-hit district in severe storms that have killed at least 42 people in Germany since late Wednesday. The small Nette river that runs through the quaint town has burst its banks and residents spent much of Wednesday night awake, trying to keep the water at bay. Many were pumping their basements and surveying the damage on Thursday, with no clear idea of when the water might recede enough to start the clean-up. Even the local fire station was pumping its own basement, with exhausted firefighters sitting nearby, while others were busy clearing away uprooted trees. - 'Nothing we could do' - Though locals were grateful they had not been as badly hit as other regions, where people have died and houses were washed away, they were still under shock. "We already had extreme floods in 2016, but these have been much worse," said Uli Walsdorf, deputy head of the Mayen fire service. "We were prepared, we had built up defences. But you can never be 100 percent prepared for events like this," he said. "We sat on the balcony and watched as the Nette overflowed. There was nothing more we could do," pensioner Mueller said, describing how friends had come to help her rescue electrical appliances from the cellar in the night. Andrea Schaer, 55, who lives nearby on the second floor of an apartment block, said residents in her building had clubbed together until 2:00 am to "save" the apartment on the ground floor. "We were lucky, the cellar is completely full and the water came up to four centimetres (1.6 inches) above the ground floor. It happened quickly, in 20 minutes the whole cellar was full, so I was a bit scared," she said. Local teacher Ortrud Meyer, 36, was waiting outside her home for an electrician after borrowing a pump to clear water from her flooded cellar. The fire service wouldn't be arriving for several hours as they had more urgent business to attend to, she said. "We are aware of the danger, but we have never seen anything like this," said Meyer, who has lived in Mayen for six years and does not keep valuables in her cellar. "My father-in-law is almost 80, he's from Mayen and says he's never experienced anything like this," she said.
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