The committee of inquiry into the flood disaster in the Ahr Valley is concerned with civil protection and communication. Prime Minister Dreyer and Interior Minister Lewentz only realized the extent of this the following day.
During the night of the floods in July 2021, the Prime Minister of Rhineland-Palatinate, Malu Dreyer, placed her trust in the on-site disaster control expertise.
“We are a country with floods,” said the SPD politician in the investigative committee of the state parliament. She was tense “because there was a flood situation in many parts of the country”. “But I also knew that our communities are well prepared and the ADD (Oversight and Service Directorate) had offered support.” Until late in the evening on July 14, she had no indication “that there would be such an unprecedented flood disaster”.
134 people lost their lives in the flash flood through the Ahr Valley. “If we now look at the flood disaster, then we do it with the knowledge of today,” said Dreyer. The state government is still required to deal with the consequences of the flood: “Not a day goes by that we don’t deal with the flood disaster.”
184 dead in Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia
“A difficult but manageable flood situation” – with these words Interior Minister Roger Lewentz had previously summarized the initial impression on the night of the flood disaster in the Ahr valley. The SPD politician described his visit to the operations center in the Ahrweiler district on July 14, 2021: “I got the impression that you work really competently and with concentration because you know your region very well.”
It was not until the next morning that the extent of the “biggest catastrophe that hit Germany after the war” gradually became visible – with 134 dead in the Ahr Valley alone and 184 in all in Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia.
With his visit to the Technical Operations Center in Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler, he wanted to “back up the municipal level,” said Lewentz in the committee’s survey. Neither on the journey to Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler nor about 25 minutes later on the return journey did he notice any signs of damage. “It actually had other local priorities,” said Lewentz, referring to the declaration of the disaster in the Vulkaneifel district and reports from other areas of the Eifel.
He was not aware that District Administrator Jürgen Pföhler (CDU) was “only briefly” present in the operations center, said the minister. He also did not know that the district administrator had delegated the management of operations to the fire and disaster control inspector (BKI). The public prosecutor’s office is investigating both of them because of an initial suspicion of negligent manslaughter and negligent bodily harm through omission because warnings were possibly too late.
Secretary of State: “No evidence of necessity”
After further exploration and phone calls, he went to sleep about two hours after midnight, the minister said. In the early morning he called Prime Minister Malu Dreyer (SPD), the police headquarters in Koblenz, the federal police and others. Then he drove back to Bad Neuenahr-Ahrweiler and was initially stopped by a police blockade. “The bridge was gone – that was my first actual impression of what must have happened there.”
There was no mention of a flood disaster in the situation reports on July 14, said State Secretary in the Ministry of the Interior, Randolf Stich (SPD). According to the information he received, “one could assume that the responsible civil protection is active on site”. He saw “no indications of the need” to “arrange further,” said Stich.
“It was an area situation that affected several districts,” said the head of the civil protection department of the national ADD, Heinz Wolschendorf. “The fact that it looks so dramatic in the Ahrweiler district only became really clear on the 15th during the day.” The ADD initially had no indication that a technical command center was not working, said Wolschendorf and ADD President Thomas Linnertz. “The circles have to seek contact if they feel overwhelmed,” said Wolschendorf in his three-and-a-half-hour interrogation in the state parliament. Otherwise there is no evidence to assume this.
Free voters are demanding his resignation
The director of the Kiel Institute for Crisis Research, Frank Roselieb, who was called in as an expert, saw clear deficits in dealing with the disaster – especially with the then District Administrator on the Ahr, Jürgen Pföhler (CDU), but also with the former Environment Minister Anne Spiegel (Greens).
The chairman of the Free Voters, Stephan Wefelscheid, said: “Director Roselieb did not give the entire state government a good report and with his statements underpins the demand of the Free Voters parliamentary group for an immediate resignation of Anne Spiegel.”
The representative of the Greens, Carl-Bernhard von Heusinger, expressly agreed with Roselieb’s criticism of District Administrator Pföhler. However, the responsibility for civil protection never lies with the Ministry of Climate Protection. “The latter transmitted the flood data to the responsible authorities in full and in good time and has thus fully fulfilled its responsibility.”
Source: Stern
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