Large areas of Central Europe remained underwater on September 16 after a weekend of torrential rain, with flood waters remaining high despite rainfall easing. 

Metereologists have warned of further rain, as the low pressure system causing the extreme weather event has been trapped by surrounding high pressure systems.

Romania, which has had the highest death toll so far with seven, has declared a state of alert in the two counties worst hit by the floods. Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu announced at the government meeting on September 16 that the procedures are under way for the Ministry of Administration and Interior to enforce a state of alert in Galati and Vaslui, which will allow the authorities to have more freedom in intervening and using existing resources.

The local authorities in Galati County requested the state of alert because approximately 6,000 households in 26 localities, as well as several roads, are impacted by the floods. A railway route between Galati and Barlad, operated by a private railway company, has been destroyed over a 5km section.

As the rain stopped on September 16 after a couple of days of heavy rainfall, the army and emergency situation inspectorate (ISU) are intervening to help the population restore water and electricity supply by re-building electricity lines and cleaning water wells. The government has disbursed RON100mn (€20mn) to help households whose homes have been severely damaged. The government also deployed from the state reserves four modular buildings to serve as school classes in the villages where the schools were damaged, until the situation returns to normal. 

In Poland so far four people have been reported dead after extreme rain first hit the south and the south-west of the country on September 12.

The Polish government has declared a state of natural disaster in southern and south-western Poland, where flood waters have receded in towns inundated early, and communities braced for the flood wave to pass through big cities Opole and Wrocław, both located on the Oder, Poland’s second biggest river.

The government said on September 16 that it has earmarked PLN1bn (€230mn) to finance meeting the affected people's immediate needs as well as to help them renovate or rebuild their houses. “It’s just the start,” Prime Minister Donald Tusk declared.

Tusk also said he will work with the leaders of other affected countries–- Czechia, Slovakia, Austria, and Romania – to ensure the EU provides financial help to fix the damage caused by the flooding. “We are going to get as much out of the EU as we can,” Tusk said.

Austria has also been among the worst-hit, with rainfall records shattered across the country, while the higher altitudes have seen heavy snowfall, unseasonably early. Hungary and Slovakia have so far been little affected but authorities are bracing for the impact of flood waters entering the Danube, which runs along the border between the two countries.

In Czechia,  water began to recede in some areas, while thousands have been evacuated as water swept through some parts of the hard-hit northeast of the country within minutes.  Some 195 stations across the country were still reported flooding situations in their locations by 3pm on September 16. 

In the latest development, the Moravian-Silesian region alone reported three dead, including two from the town of Krnov, which was completely cut off by the raging water. Another at least eight persons are missing. 

The Krnov mayor told Czech Televison (CT) that 80% of the town was underwater. Water levels in some of the rivers in the region, including Opava, were above their centennial high.

The Czech cabinet is to hold an emergency session where it will also discuss whether to postpone regional and Senate elections scheduled for September 20-21.

The country’s Prime Minister Petr Fiala, who visited the hard-hit area of Jeseniky, declared that the cabinet’s focus is on renewing elementary infrastructure. “We need to secure absolutely the elementary life needs of people and municipalities, secure electricity, heat, help with food,” Fiala was quoted as saying by the Czech Press Agency (CTK).  

The local branch of the Red Cross, Czech humanitarian NGO Man in Need, or Charita has been raising money to help those most in need.  

The Czech Hydrometeorological Institute (CHMI) has active warnings against flooding issued for all 14 regions in the country except for the Karlovarsky (Carlsbad) region in the west of Czechia.

“Rain is gradually weakening, but for the soaked soil even a small rainfall is sufficient to bring about more floods,” CHMI stated in the latest press release, adding that further rainfall is now expected in South Bohemia and that  “the situation remains critical on northern Moravia” while “in [regional capital] Ostrava a dam broke and an evacuation of the population is underway.

“I plead to everyone returning to flooded houses to observe hygienic rules, be careful with the safety of food and water and not to use water from flooded wells,” Minister of Environment Petr Hladik (KDU-CSL) stated.       

Despite the disastrous flooding and loss of life, experts surveyed by bne Intellinews say that the country was much better prepared than during the tragic floods in 1997, when water destroyed scores of villages and towns in the Zlin region, or in 2002 when large part of the capital Prague city centre got flooded.

“Major funding from the EU and also national resources were disbursed in the past two decades,” the ex-director of the State Environmental Fund of the Czech Republic (SEF) Frantisek Krejci told bne Intellinews,

Krejci explained that this includes “a wide scope of measures” ranging from a system of monitoring to individual projects such as dam constructions and enhancing soil retention projects. Krejci also noted that special subsidy programmes focused specifically on areas with high risk of flooding were introduced.

An environment ministry source told bne Intellinews that since 2007, when the first regular EU-funded subsidy programme began to be implemented at the ministry,  close to CZK31bn (€1.23bn) has been spent on all the flood-related measures combined.

This figure does not include additional investments made by the Ministry of Agriculture which has also made major investments into flood-related measures since Czechia’s accession to the EU in 2004.