More than 150 dead as f looding rages across Germany, Belgium
Officials: It may take weeks to fully recover
BERLIN — German military units helped clear roads Saturday and open more rescue routes into areas devastated by massive floods that claimed more than 150 lives in Germany and Belgium and raised alarms that the disaster was a glimpse into growing threats from climate change.
But even as the waters receded — and crews begin to shore up flooddamaged buildings and roads — the death count continued to grow.
German police said that more than 130 people died in flooding in western parts of the country after torrential rains that began Wednesday triggered a catastrophe that unfolded at astonishing speed: rivers pouring over their banks, bridges buckling and hillsides giving way in a rush a mud and debris. Belgium’s national crisis center said at least 24 people were dead.
“A lot of people have lost everything they spent their lives building up — their possessions, their home, the roof over their heads,” German President Frank-Walter Steinmeier said during a visit to the flood-battered town of Erftstadt near Cologne. “It may only be possible to clear up in weeks how much damage needs to be compensated.”
Photographs and aerial video showed scenes of total — and sudden — devastation in the heart of Europe: a train stranded at a swamped station, vehicles abandoned on waterlogged roadways, survivors floating down a city street on rubber boats.
A television interview with a Belgian mayor was interrupted when a house in the background started to crumble. Bricks and belongings poured from the home into the flooded street — and two people tried to escape through the roof.
“We are still waiting for a definitive toll, but it could be that this flood becomes the most catastrophic our country has ever known,” Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo said Friday.
The storm — a major low-pressure system that stretched from Germany to France — brought a deluge Thursday that quickly swelled rivers, damaged bridges and roads, and left many people scrambling to rooftops or onto fallen trees.
More than 1,000 rescue operations have been carried out in the hardest-hit areas since early Thursday, authorities said. In some places, helicopters were the only way to reach stranded people.
By midday Friday, the death toll in Germany had climbed to more than 100, according to German media reports citing officials. At least 50 people died in the southwestern state of Rhineland-Palatinate, and 43 died in neighboring North Rhine-Westphalia, security officials said.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, fresh off a trip to Washington, met via video conference with a crisis team Friday. She was briefed on rescue efforts and pledged government support.