For those who are worried that summer won’t break through here: some other European (alpine) countries are currently in the process of returning to autumn and even winter. Both Austria and Germany are struggling with floods and snowfall, and a thick layer of fresh snow has even fallen on mountains in Switzerland, Austria, Slovenia and Italy.
Several rivers have flooded in southern Germany due to heavy rains. Several districts in the state of Bavaria have declared a state of emergency. People trapped in houses have been evacuated by boat and helicopter.
A state of emergency was declared on Saturday in the districts of Günzburg, Augsburg, Aichach-Friedberg and Neu-Ulm in the southern part of the country. The ditch and dam also collapsed in Augsburg. The situation is particularly acute around the Roth, Osterbach and Biber rivers.
According to local authorities in Augsburg, the water level may rise significantly in the next few hours. They expect the water level to be once a century.
The German weather service has issued the highest storm warning for the municipalities of Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg. This is valid in most places on Sunday.
Prison
The police and the fire department had to respond several times due to the storm. Heavy rains have also caused several accidents on the highway, in which some motorists have been injured. The fire department is helping to lay down sandbags to prevent water from entering the houses, but despite this, many basements have already flooded. Many trains in southern Germany do not run either.
A prison in Memmingen, Bavaria, has been evacuated because the stream that flows next to it is in danger of flooding. According to Bild, the police had to help with many vehicles to move all 150 prisoners to four other prisons.
(Read more under the pictures)
© AFP
© AFP
© AFP
The highest mountain in the country
On Germany’s highest peak, the Zugspitze, 2,962 meters, as much as 60 centimeters of fresh snow has fallen in the last few hours. According to Bild, the “summer” snow caused 29 climbers to get stuck a few hundred meters from the summit on Saturday. “The group is exhausted and probably not equipped enough,” a spokesman for the local mountain rescue service told the German newspaper. “It is unclear why they attempted to climb the Zugspitze despite the extreme weather forecast.”
Several rescue teams were dispatched and the entire group has now been safely removed from the mountain and taken to safer places.
Austria
It also rained continuously in the Austrian provinces of Vorarlberg and Tyrol. The fire department had to respond 130 times in Vorarlberg on Friday, reports the Tiroler Tageszeitung newspaper. The water level of the Leiblach, the border river between Vorarlberg and Germany, is worrying. “Water levels continued to rise after midnight,” a fire service spokesman said.
The weather is very different in the Alps. Fresh snow is falling everywhere in Western Austria at an altitude of more than 1500 meters. In the states of Voralberg and Tyrol, up to 70 centimeters will fall above 2,300 meters, increasing the risk of avalanches. The authorities are therefore asking hikers not to go to the mountains.
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“Today is the first day of the Meteorological Summer of 2024. A fresh layer of snow fell last night at the Kredarica weather station (2,515 meters, the highest in Slovenia, ed.). Not exceptional, but still a nice way to celebrate the start of summer,” reports the Alpine-Adriatic Meteorological Society of the fallen.
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