The high water gradually drops, and as the hours pass, new dead are discovered. For the rescuers, in the flooded areas of central Europe, the grueling race over time to save the missing is not over yet. The toll of the disaster in Germany is dramatic, first of all in terms of human lives: at least 156 victims and a thousand injured. In Belgium, too, there are 27 deaths and 103 people of whom there is no news after the catastrophe caused by the rain. Bulletins constantly updated: these numbers, it is warned, will rise again. In the landscape devastated by the unstoppable force of water and mud, the material damage, priceless for now, is enormous. Houses, shops, destroyed cars, and entire communities shocked, in their villages transfigured within hours. “Your destiny rips our hearts out of our breasts”,
“For many people in the region there is nothing left but hope and we have a duty not to disappoint it”, he added, urging the whole community to be in solidarity “in small as well as in large gestures”. The severe thunderstorms of recent days continued to cause damage and fear even in the night, when the bank of the Rur river collapsed, and in the city of Wassenberg (in the Heinsberg district) 700 people were evacuated as a precaution. In the next few days “precipitation is not expected to give an effect” to the flow of water still in motion, and this is good news, in the country that keeps an eye on the level of the Rhine, which in the Cologne area has reached the 8.06 meters high. The most serious bulletin comes from Rhineland-Platinates, where at least 98 people have died and there are currently 670 injured, according to data released by the Koblenz police. The Ministry of the Interior of North Rhine-Westphalia reported 43 victims and 362 injured. Numbers that are still provisional and already extremely dramatic, marking what President Armin Laschet has called “the catastrophe of the century”. “I am sad and shocked to see this devastation. We Europeans are with you in this difficult moment with all our hearts. Your pain is ours, but we will get out of it together,” said the president of the EU Commission, Ursula von der Leyen. , after an inspection in the Belgian towns of Rochefort and Pepinster affected by the floods. Angela Merkel, returning from a state visit to the US, from where she has nevertheless followed the development and effects of the ”
In Germany there are 23,000 people mobilized in the regions of the flood: in addition to the firefighters, the police and the Technische Hilfswerk, the army intervenes with 900 soldiers and its tanks, to face the disaster on the roads. Engaged in enormous work, all the rescuers are struggling tirelessly to help the population. Yesterday there was also some positive news: such as the first returns to the houses of Trier, in the Ehrang district, where the flooding of the Kyll river had caused the eviction of 1,000 people due to damage to 670 houses, where the water it had destroyed cellars and close-ups. But for those who will be able to sleep in their room again, after the technical appraisals to ascertain that there has been no damage to the statics of the buildings, water and electricity are still lacking. Furthermore, in the city of Erftstadt (Westphalia), where some houses had been overwhelmed and destroyed by the flood, there were no victims. The searches in the two most affected Laender continued unabated until darkness arrived, from above, aboard the helicopters, but also house by house.
