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WEATHER

Northern Germany hit with flooding after storm

A clean-up is underway on Thursday after severe storms in the northern part of the country.

Published: 15 October 2020 09:56 CEST
Northern Germany hit with flooding after storm
A man wading through the flooding in Lübeck. Photo: DPA

Water levels rose significantly in coastal areas of Germany due to storms and severe rain on Wednesday.

In Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, flooding reached its peak on Wednesday evening. It brought water levels to almost 1.40 metres above normal, said meteorologist Stefan Kreibohm from the weather station at Hiddensee.

In Schleswig-Holstein, the Trave river in Lübeck and the district of Travemünde rose to around 6.26 metres. This resulted in flooding at the Obertrave in the old town of Lübeck and parts of the promenade in Travemünde. According to the Waterways and Shipping Office, the normal water level is five metres.

After the flood, the focus is now on the damage: the district of Vorpommern-Greifswald was particularly affected in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania. On Wednesday, alarm stage 2 was triggered there due to rising water levels.

READ ALSO: 'Last days to enjoy the sun': Temperatures in Germany to dip as summer ends

In the second of four alarm stages, the dams were to be checked for damage and, if necessary, sealed with sandbags, the State Office for Agriculture and the Environment (StALU) said.

'Trees blown onto roads'

The storm also knocked down several trees and branches throughout the district.

Firefighters had to remove the debris from roads and railways. The rescue control centre reported more than 60 such operations in the region by the afternoon. According to police reports, trees had fallen onto two cars in the Stralsund area.

This tweet by the German Weather Service shows there was lots of rain across Germany on Wednesday.

In Rostock-Warnemünde water spilled over onto the pier. Beach chairs were left floating in the water and had to be salvaged.

The storm washed sand from the beaches into the sea. According to media reports, Lubmin's mayor Axel Vogt expects there has been flood damage to the newly raised beach in Meckenburg-Western Pomerania.

Flooding in Lübeck. Photo: DPA

'Water levels slowing falling'

The Federal Maritime and Hydrographic Agency (BSH) extended the storm surge warning in the Baltic Sea area until Thursday. According to the warning, water levels of up to 1.15 metres above average sea level were still to be expected on almost the entire German Baltic coast.

However, it is improving. “The water levels along the coast are slowly falling,” the agency said, however.

Many shipping companies stopped their ferry operations on Wednesday. The shipping company FRS Baltic, which operates the Swedish fast ferry between Sassnitz-Mukran and Ystad, also cancelled departures for Thursday.

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CLIMATE CRISIS

Record heat deaths and floods: How Germany is being hit by climate change

Germany was further confronted with extreme weather conditions and their consequences last year. With this summer likely to break records again, a new report shows the impact climate change is having.

Published: 22 April 2024 11:28 CEST
Record heat deaths and floods: How Germany is being hit by climate change

In 2023, more days of extremely high temperatures were recorded than at any time since records began, the European climate change service Copernicus and the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) wrote in a joint report published on Monday. 

The records go back to 1940 and sometimes even further.

“2023 has been a complex and multifaceted year in terms of climate hazards in Europe,” said Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S) Director Carlo Buontempo. “We have witnessed widespread flooding, but also extreme forest fires with high temperatures and severe droughts.” 

These events have put a strain on natural ecosystems, and have also challenged agriculture, water management and public health.

According to the report, around 1.6 million people were affected by floods last year, and more than half a million people were affected by storms. The weather- and climate-related damage is estimated at well over 10 billion euros. “Unfortunately, these numbers are unlikely to decrease in the near future,” Buontempo said, referring to ongoing human-caused climate change.

Heat turns deadly, even in Germany

Averaged across Europe, 11 months of above-average warmth were recorded last year, with September being the warmest since records began in 1940. 

A record number of days with so-called extreme heat stress, i.e. perceived temperatures of over 46C, was also registered. 

As a result of higher temperatures, the number of heat-related deaths has risen by an average of 30 percent over the past 20 years.

According to the Robert Koch Institute, at least 3,100 deaths in Germany were linked to heat in the first nine months of 2023.

“In some cases, for example heat stroke, heat exposure leads directly to death, while in most cases it is the combination of heat exposure and pre-existing conditions that leads to death,” RKI explained in a statement, adding that women tend to be affected more than men due to higher proportion of women in older age groups.

In Germany temperatures above 30C are considered a heatwave. As weather patterns change due to human-caused climate change, heat waves have increased in number and length.

READ ALSO: How German cities are adapting to rising temperatures

Historically Germany hasn’t faced so many severe heatwaves each year, and central air conditioning is not commonly found in the country. In cities across the Bundesrepublik, heat plans are being drafted and refined to try and prepare for further extreme heat events in the near future.

Delivery van stuck in flood

A delivery van stranded in flood water during a storm surge near the fish market in Hamburg last winter. Photo: picture alliance/dpa | Bodo Marks
 

Warming oceans and mountains and more rain

On average, the seas around Europe’s coasts were warmer than at any time since at least 1980. 

READ ALSO: Colder winters and refugees – How changing ocean currents could impact Germany

It was also much too warm on the glaciers in 2023. “After the record ice loss in 2022, it was another exceptional year of loss in the Alps,” Copernicus and WMO wrote. In these two years, the glaciers in the Alps lost around 10 percent of their volume.

Interestingly, the excess meltwater may be boosting hydroelectricity production in the short term. According to the report, conditions for the production of green electricity in 2023 were very favourable, with its share of the total electricity mix at 43 percent, the highest seen so far.

Overall, seven percent more rain fell last year than average. It was one of the wettest years on record, the report said. 

In one third of the river network in Europe, water volumes have been recorded that exceeded the flood threshold. There were severe floods in Italy and Greece, among other places, and parts of northern Germany were affected at the end of the year.

Hamburg and the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein were among regions hardest hit by floods in Germany last year. Northern sections of the Elbe river rose high enough to submerge Hamburg’s fish market several times among other places.

READ ALSO: Germany hit by floods as October heat turns into icy spell

2024 likely to continue breaking heat records

The recent report by Copernicus and the World Meteorological Organization is in agreement with a UN report published last month, which noted that last year came at the end of “the warmest 10-year period on record” according to the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO).

“There is a high probability that 2024 will again break the record of 2023”, WMO climate monitoring chief Omar Baddour said, according to Science Alert.

Another year of record breaking high temperatures means Germany can likely expect more and longer heatwaves in the late spring, summer and early autumn seasons. Higher average temperatures are also correlated with an increase in extreme weather events like extreme storms and floods in parts of the country.

In drier parts of Europe it means an increase in droughts and wildfires.

With reporting by DPA.

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