The images of the streets and houses torn away by the flood went around the world. One month after the devastating flood disaster, those involved are trying to look ahead.
Guilt / Düsseldorf – Tim Himmes’ plaster is knocking off the still damp walls of his house with a hammer. “I hope that I’ll be finished with the living room by Christmas,” says the showman in his badly damaged house in the flood area of the Ahr Valley.
According to the police, 133 people died there in the catastrophe after heavy rain on July 14th and 15th. What about a month later in the once idyllic tourist and red wine area that was largely submerged by the nocturnal tidal wave?
“We don’t have running water yet, so we shower next door in our trailer,” says Himmes in the village of Schuld an der Ahr. “We still have our children’s carousel. But our booth with the raffle and our cars swam away. ”He was grateful to the many helpers. Also for emergency state aid in the four-digit range. “We even got a small used car donated by private parties,” says Himmes. He and parts of his family can currently only live on the second floor of the house.
A lot has already happened, says Katharina Kläsgen, an employee in a provisional citizens’ office in a white tent in front of the village church. “But it will be years before guilt is as beautiful as it was before. Too much infrastructure was destroyed. ”And some houses were also badly damaged by the flood.
Several were in debt destroyed by the flash flood, others were later demolished because of the risk of collapse. Elsewhere in the Ahr Valley, too, open spaces between buildings have been yawning again and again: here, houses could no longer be saved.
Oppressive mood
The Federal Armed Forces, Technical Relief Organization (THW), fire brigade, police, injured residents and private helpers are still deployed on a large scale. Rubbish, fallen trees, empty heating oil tanks and sometimes destroyed cars are piled on top of each other. Many streets are dirty, others are broken. It smells musty between damaged houses with partly missing window panes. There is an oppressive atmosphere in the summer air.
According to its own words, the THW initially brought together around 3,000 workers in the Ahr valley. Now there are still around 1500. THW spokesman Michael Walsdorf says: “We’ll stay until the end of September, then we’ll see.” The THW has already pumped out 650,000 liters of heating oil. And cleared many muddy streets full of rubbish. The construction of temporary bridges over the Ahr continues, initially ten should be struck. Most of the previous crossings have been destroyed.
According to the State Office for Mobility (LBM) Rhineland-Palatinate, many damaged roads have so far only been temporarily repaired. “You have to adapt. There can be unexpected potholes and even sloping embankments, ”explains LBM spokeswoman Birgit Küppers. It is unclear how long the upgrading of the road network will take. “We are still recording the damage. Then the costs are determined and a catalog of measures is developed. “
In general, the state office continues to advise against unnecessary trips to the flood areas. Nevertheless, there are clearly some tourists and day trippers on the winding Ahr river, which is now less than half a meter deep in many places. A number of national roads are also completely blocked.
Private helpers before departure
Aid workers anticipate that many private helpers in the Ahr Valley will soon have to move away and return to their jobs. Looking at farmers removing sludge with tractors who are calling home the harvest, farmer Markus Wipperfürth told the German Press Agency: “I could imagine that 80 percent might move away.”
Helping building contractors would also have to earn money again and accept orders. However, there are also farmers who leave a tractor with a driver on their departure from the Ahr, added Wipperfürth. The Ahr flood helper and farmer from near Cologne recently raised 80,350 euros for the victims of the disaster by auctioning his baseball cap.
In the North Rhine-Westphalian district of Euskirchen, the situation is “diffuse” after four weeks, according to a district spokesman: the greatest damage could have been repaired in some places – flooded cellars were cleared – in other areas such as Bad Münstereifel or Schleiden-Gemünd But there are still very large construction sites. Many roads and bridges have been destroyed and continue to be closed. In some districts around Bad Münstereifel, drinking water still has to be boiled. More than half of the 47 people who died in the disaster in North Rhine-Westphalia are in this district to the west of Bonn in the Eifel.
Due to the flood, around 200,000 people in the network area of the Eon subsidiary Westnetz in North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate had no electricity. Meanwhile, more than 199,000 customers have been supplied again, announced a Westnetz spokesman on Thursday. Bad Münstereifel and Euskirchen are currently particularly affected. According to Prime Minister Armin Laschet (CDU), the damage caused by the storm in North Rhine-Westphalia amounts to more than 13 billion euros according to initial estimates. dpa
