BELGIUM
First the good news: despite the heavy rainfall in recent days, the situation in our country looks quite good. Yesterday, up to 15 mm of rain fell in Flanders, but the water level is already falling again on most non-navigable waterways, Waterinfo reports. The watch or pre-watch thresholds are currently still being exceeded on the Dender, the Demer, the Grote Nete, the Dijle and the Nieuwpoort-Dunkirk Canal, but the high water levels are expected to stabilize and drop in the coming days. In some places the lower reaches still overflow their banks and fields and meadows are flooded.
Below the language border the situation is largely the same story, except in the province of Liège. In the south of that province, in and around Burg-Reuland, the Our has exceeded the alarm thresholds. The peak of the flooding was last night, but there too the decline will start on Tuesday. The Amblève and the Vesder, also in Liège, have exceeded the pre-alert thresholds, but are now falling again.
THE NETHERLANDS
The situation in the Netherlands is worse than ours. The water level is rising in several provinces. In Dutch Limburg, traditionally the water problem area par excellence, this time it was not too bad.
Nine water boards have ‘scaled up’, especially in the east, extra people and resources have been deployed. For example, water levels have been measured around the Regge, Dinkel and Vecht that occur once every ten years.
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In Nijverdal in the province of Overijssel, people were without power for a while during the night from Monday to Tuesday, after a switching station was half flooded due to high water. In the provincial capital Zwolle, the city canals are filling up and the hamlet of Fortmond in the municipality of Olst-Wijhe is no longer accessible by car due to high water. Residents are taken to and from the mainland by ferry.
During the day on Tuesday, sandbags will be placed at the quay wall along the IJssel in Deventer to protect against high water, a spokesperson for the municipality reports. The water in the IJssel appears to be rising a centimeter per hour. As a result, De Welle, the road between the city center and the IJssel, is closed to traffic.
Emergency dikes are being constructed in several places in Groningen, reports the Hunze en Aa water board. The Vechtstromen water board is also installing additional pumping stations due to the rise in the Vecht. According to the water board, the water will reach its highest point on Wednesday, December 27. But the water level will remain high even after Wednesday.
In the city of Arnhem, in the province of Gelderland, many cellars were flooded and in other parts of the province people also stood with their feet in the water.
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In the province of North Brabant, a holiday park and restaurant were flooded in the municipality of Kaatsheuvel and a new housing estate in Eindhoven is at risk of flooding. In North Holland, quays and parking lots have been flooded in several places along the IJsselmeer.
It is not only the rain in the Netherlands in recent days that is causing flooding in our northern neighbors. The precipitation that falls here and in Germany, and even the melting snow in Switzerland, also finds its way to the North Sea via the Dutch rivers. As a result, the water level will continue to rise in various places for a few days. In Lobith, the border town where the Rhine flows into the Netherlands, the peak is not expected until December 28. If the predictions come true, the Waalkade in the city of Nijmegen, among other things, will be flooded.
But despite the high water, water safety is not at risk anywhere, the Union of Water Boards reported on Tuesday. The situation is “manageable” with the measures taken, according to the association of 21 water boards in the Netherlands. The dikes are strong enough. However, the water can cause nuisance. For example, quays, cycle paths and crawl spaces can be flooded. Rising groundwater can also cause problems.
GERMANY
The persistent rain and swampy soil also increase the risk of flooding in large parts of Germany. Many roads are flooded and the fire brigade and civil protection are trying to protect houses with sandbags.
Perhaps the wettest Christmas was for the more than five hundred residents of the village of Windehausen, in the central state of Thuringia. The water was up to a meter high in some places. They spent Christmas with family or in a sports hall after having to leave their homes due to high water levels.
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In the state of Lower Saxony, authorities are particularly concerned about the Oker dam in Harz. The reservoir there has reached its maximum capacity. The residents of the city of Braunschweig therefore have to wait and see. They could therefore be hit by an additional wave on Tuesday evening that could worsen the current flooding.
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In the municipality of Leer, in Lower Saxony, hundreds of firefighters tried to prevent dikes from breaching on Tuesday night with sandbags. This ultimately proved successful and the water level dropped about 30 centimeters during the night.
Train traffic had to be halted between Hanover and Magdeburg, the capitals of Lower Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt respectively, after ballast was washed away under the track. The interruption would last until Wednesday.
Closer to Belgium, in the neighboring state of North Rhine-Westphalia, the tributaries of the Weser are very high: the highest warning threshold was exceeded at several measuring stations.
In the states of Rijnland-Platz, which borders the province of Liège, and Saarland, the water level is also said to be decreasing and this would also be the case in the coming days. The situation is also improving in Bavaria and Hesse.
The German weather service predicts further persistent rain in several regions, especially from the western low mountains to the Harz Mountains. It will also be stormy in some places. Flooding is expected in streams and rivers. Landslides can also occur.
The Federal Maritime and Hydrographic Agency (BSH) warned of storm surges in the Weser region and on the North Sea coast of Lower Saxony. Bremen, Bremerhaven, Elsfleth, Brake and Rechtenfleth on the Weser and Wilhelmshaven on the North Sea were specifically mentioned.
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ENGLAND
Storm Gerrit will hit Britain on Wednesday, bringing strong winds and heavy rain to large parts of the country, weather forecasters have warned. It is going to snow in parts of Scotland.
Code yellow for wind and rain will apply in many places, and code yellow for rain and snow in most of Scotland, meteorologist Simon Partridge said.
He added that the wind will be strong in England and on the English coast. “There is also a warning of strong winds in parts of west Wales, north-west England, Northern Ireland, northern Scotland and the Northern Isles,” with gusts of 50 to over 60 miles per hour, Patridge said.