Floods in Germany & Benelux: 180+ dead, 1,300+ missing, 100k without power

[Supersonic 49,376]

At least 49 people have died in parts of western Germany amid heavy rains and flooding, local police said on Thursday. Most of the deaths have been reported in the states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate.

The flooding has heavily impacted transport in the region, which lies near the borders to Belgium, Luxembourg, France and the Netherlands. Weather forecasters say more rain is expected in the coming days.

https://www.dw.com/en/at-least-40-dead-after-floods-in-germany-several-missing-live-updates/a-58270820

Germany: 157 people dead, 1,300+ missing, 200,000 people temporarily without power, over 100k without power still at this point (July 18th)
Belgium: 27 people dead, 4+ missing
Italy: 1 person dead
 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2021_European_floods
https://www.t-online.de/nachrichten/panorama/id_90444778/newsblog-zur-unwetter-katastrophe-kreis-ahrweiler-geht-von-etwa-1-300-vermissten-aus.html

 

 

[SharkmanthaC 115,047]

This is awful. Please evacuate if you live near this and have the means to. If you don’t then please be safe. 

[GagaSine 7,464]

It really feels like we are living at the end of the world  hoping everyone manages to stay safe

[Mother of Puppies 36,615]

My sister could thankfully escape yesterday because her boss told her to leave and go home earlier. if she had left an hour later she would’ve been stuck there. The building where my sis works is pretty much ****ed.

This is only about 25 miles from we live. 

[RahrahWitch 6,985]

Oh my god, That is so sad  Please stay safe everyone in west Europe

How many more natural disasters need to happen around the globe for world leaders to take climate change more seriously?

[ARTPOPe 10,169]

It's absolutely insane.

Luckily we didn't get affected too much.
Some roads are flooded, a nearby chemical plant suffered a bit of damage and leaked some (mostly harmless) chemicals into the water, so we were told not to use tap water for a few hours till they figured out what exactly happened, but overall it's nothing too serious here.
Yet just 10-15 kilometers from here it's absolute chaos and devastation.

A friend had to evacuate cause a local dam might actually break and flood the region due to it holding way too much water, some roads are completely gone/flooded and another dam is already spilling over.

Really scary to witness.

[alsemanche 97,801]

Everything is so apocalyptic that my very first reaction to this kind of news has become "oh yet another tragedy?".

This is really scary. I hope everyone affected and near is safe and taking their best precautions 

[Ivy 13,721]

39 minutes ago, MotherOfPuppies said:

My sister could thankfully escape yesterday because her boss told her to leave and go home earlier. if she had left an hour later she would’ve been stuck there. The building where my sis works is pretty much ****ed.

This is only about 25 miles from we live. 

Omg pls be careful 

[berlinforme 5,385]

Fun fact: Germany is on course to elect a chancellor from Angela Merkel's party again in September. A guy who just renewed support for coal, reduced support for renewables and is the governor of the German state where this is happening right now. Cheers to that, great job, conservatives. 

[LaLuna 12,732]

That's crazy, praying for all the people affected.

But at the same time, if we keep treating our planet like crap and don't take dramatic steps to stop climate change, Mother Nature will keep responding accordingly.

[Supersonic 49,376]

Strong rains will resume this night. Please evacuate as soon as you possibly can and listen to your local authorities. 

[Head Empty 26,982]

Thousands of people are being evacuated in the south of The Netherlands tonight. Most heavy rain has stopped here, but one of our biggest rivers (Meuse) is still rising rapidly, and is expected to overflow in various densely populated areas around 2-3am, local time.

Honestly the amount of **** society has had to go through these past two years is getting out of hand. I'm usually not religious or spiritual but it's starting to feel like a reckoning.

Hoping everyone stays safe 

[Supersonic 49,376]

Unfortunate updates: The death toll has increased to over 100 people over night. This is now the deadliest natural disaster to ever hit Western and Central Europe since World War 2 (which somehow is classified as a natural disaster).

Over night, more German towns completely flooded, massive landslide happened due to the heavy rainfall, tearing away entire landstrips. 

According to the DWD (Germany's authority monitoring the weather), the rainfall of the last two days was highest Germany has recorded in 100 years.

The German army has been deployed to help people in the affected regions.

[Guest]

it's time for revolution and get these ****ing conservatives out of our governments !! 

[Supersonic 49,376]

Update:

The rains have no reached the Alpine region, where several munincipalities have already declared the state of catastrophe. 

The streets of the Germany's southernmost town have flooded, several news outlets have reports about the rain causing landslides in mountain villages, tearing away entire houses. People are advised to not go to their basements or underground garages under any circumstance and evacuate their houses if they live within 200m of a river basin. 

The neighboring Austria, specially the state of Salzburg, has also been hit with floods and declared the state of emergency. 

Up north, the overall death toll unfortunately increased to 143 in Germany and 27 in Belgium. German authorities already announced that the death toll will eventually skyrocket in the next few days because the recovery operations take extremely long (several towns are still flooded and are not able to be reached, sans helicopter).

Flooded basements and cars have not been checked out at all as of now.