Budapest braces for swollen Danube

The swollen River Danube is approaching Budapest, where soldiers and volunteers are building flood walls, officials said.

Parts of the south and north ends of the Hungarian capital are already under water, but the city’s central area, including the parliament building and several large hotels near the river bank, are seemingly out of direct danger as flood walls were built to a height of 30.5ft.

Officials said nearly 8,000 volunteers and specialised crews in Budapest had strengthened flood walls by packing and placing one million sand bags and many are also monitoring defences for any leaks.

Meanwhile thousands of people have been evacuated from their homes in a region of eastern Germany where the Elbe river has flooded and burst through a dam.

At least 21 flood-related deaths have been reported in central Europe, as rivers such as the Danube, the Elbe and the Vlatava have overflowed after a week of heavy rains and caused extensive damage in central and southern Germany, the Czech Republic, Austria, Slovakia and Hungary.

The latest fatality was an 80-year-old man who died of a heart attack in Austria while cleaning up debris caused by flooding, the German news agency dpa reported.

In Magdeburg, the state capital of Saxony-Anhalt in eastern Germany, more than 23,000 had to leave their homes yesterday after many streets and buildings were flooded and electricity was shut off, dpa said.

The neighborhood of Rothensee was especially hard hit by the floods of the Elbe river and people were being evacuated with tanks, trucks and buses.

“Rothensee is filling up like a bathtub,” Germany army spokesman Andre Sabzog said.

Around 700 soldiers were trying frantically to build a dam of sandbags around a power substation. A flooding of the sub-station would not only leave thousands of households without water, but also lead to a breakdown of the neighbourhood’s de-watering pumps.

Another 8,000 people had been evacuated from the town of Aken and its neighboring villages after a dam on the Elbe river broke on Saturday, police spokesman Uwe Holz said.

Further north on the Elbe river, residents were trying to protect themselves from flooding by building levees along the banks of the rising waterway.

Officials in Saxony-Anhalt state also were investigating what appeared to be a threat to destroy dams.

Several media outlets said they had received a letter threatening to blow up dams on the Elbe river, Holger Stahlknecht, the state’s interior minister, said.

“We are taking the letter seriously,” he said. He said authorities have stepped up their surveillance of dams and urged residents to remain calm.

In Hungary, officials said the flooded Danube River was expected to reach Budapest today, but that defences should keep the water out of most of the capital.

Prime minister Viktor Orban said no casualties had been reported in his country, but 7,000 soldiers and thousands of volunteers were packing sandbags on the banks of the Danube to shore up flood walls.

“The flood is now approaching Budapest, the heart of the country,” Mr Orban said in Esztergom, 30 miles north of Budapest.

“Two decisive days are ahead of us because the danger will be where most people live and where most things of value are at risk. It is now when we have to gather all our strength.”

While no flood-related deaths or injuries have been reported in Hungary, around 1,400 people have been evacuated from towns and villages along the Danube, including more than 200 in Budapest.