Disaster alert in southern Germany: firefighter dead

A firefighter died in the Bavarian town of Pfaffenhofen an der Ilm when his rubber dinghy capsized during an operation with three colleagues, a spokesman for the authorities said on Sunday. He was recovered dead in the morning. Disaster alerts were declared in ten municipalities in Bavaria due to overflowing rivers and streams.

• also read: Flooding in Upper Austria? “Warning limits likely to be reached”

Train cancellations and delays

On Saturday evening, two ICE carriages derailed in Schwäbisch Gmünd – but the passengers were uninjured. Further rain and thunderstorms could lead to new flooding on Sunday afternoon. Rail travelers in southern Germany had to expect further train cancellations and delays on Sunday. According to a list on the Deutsche Bahn website, there will be cancellations on the route from Munich via Nuremberg to Berlin, from Karlsruhe via Stuttgart to Munich, from Munich to Zurich and from Augsburg to Oberstdorf.

The German Weather Service (DWD) said on Saturday that new showers and thunderstorms were moving in from the north, which would bring with them the risk of local flooding, especially on Sunday afternoon. The showers could be heavy and would pass slowly. “If that hits the saturated ground, you’ll quickly have flooding there again,” said the meteorologist.

The Swabian Jura and areas to the north of it, as well as the region around Augsburg, Nuremberg, Bamberg and Regensburg, are particularly at risk from the showers and thunderstorms on Sunday. In the Augsburg district, evacuation calls were expanded in the evening. Municipalities on the Schmutter river were particularly affected. Emergency accommodation was set up in the Augsburg trade fair.

ICE wagons derailed

For the night into Sunday, there were signs of a slight easing of the precipitation. The persistent rain will ease over the course of the night, said a DWD meteorologist on Saturday evening. “Tonight, there won’t be as much rain as we had last night,” he said.

After the persistent rain of the past few days, two carriages of an ICE train derailed late on Saturday evening in Schwäbisch Gmünd, Baden-Württemberg. According to a railway spokesman, the 185 passengers were uninjured in the accident and were taken off the train. The train had been diverted to the route on which the accident occurred due to the flooding in southern Germany.

Following the landslide, there is currently no long-distance rail service between Stuttgart and Munich. A railway spokesman was unable to estimate how long the route would be interrupted early on Sunday morning. According to Deutsche Bahn, there had already been disruptions and train cancellations in southern Germany beforehand. Due to the flooding, no trains ran between Munich, Bregenz and Zurich all day Saturday.

Flood of the century

In Bavaria, the persistent rain led to water levels that, statistically speaking, are only reached once in a hundred years. On Sunday night, the rivers Günz, Memminger Ach, Kammel, Mindel, Paar and Maisach carried as much water as in a once-in-a-century flood. In the northern part of the Upper Bavarian district of Pfaffenhofen an der Ilm, local authorities fear extreme flooding.

Rain was not the only problem for people in Germany. On the Leiblach river, which borders Germany and Vorarlberg, the water levels had already dropped overnight into Saturday after extreme flooding. “We got off lightly,” said a spokesperson for the rescue control center. At times, the water levels were as high as during a flood, which statistically only occurs every 100 to 300 years.

There were also storms in northern Italy. In Switzerland, heavy rainfall led to numerous floods, landslides and flooded cellars.