As of: January 28, 2024, 4:08 p.m
By: Patrick Staar
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Almost all houses hit: Benediktbeuern a few days after the hailstorm.
© Municipality/Ortlieb
Benediktbeuern - No one who experienced it will forget the 150th year of the Benediktbeuern fire department.
For the anniversary in 2023, one event followed the next - and then the hailstorm drove the number of operations to unprecedented heights.
The volunteers in _Benediktbeuern had a lot to do in 2023.
This ranges from setting up the summit cross on the Benediktenwand to the duck race.
And then the hailstorm came on August 26th.
“You really can’t pack more than you into a year,” said district fire officer Erich Zengerle, commenting on the fire department’s annual report at the annual meeting in the fire station.
716 missions in one year
You could already guess what Zengerle meant by looking at the statistics: While the Benediktbeuren firefighters had to go out on 39 missions in 2022, in 2023 there were a whopping 716. Of these, 671 were related to the hailstorm.
Reminded the hailstorm in August 2023: Daniel Sliva, fire brigade commander in Benediktbeuern.
© Patrick Staar
No staff at the beginning
The disaster was also the focus of Commander Daniel Sliva's annual report.
“No one has probably ever experienced an operation of this magnitude here before - and hopefully will never have to experience it again.” At the start of the operation on Saturday (August 26th), the fire brigade management had no staff available: “That is understandable Everything was broken in the whole village and in the neighboring villages.
You had to make sure that everything was sorted out in your own house.”
Sliva himself only arrived at the fire station after an hour.
“My brother-in-law moved into his new house that very day,” the commander recalled.
The car was not ready to drive due to the hail damage; the commander had to repair the bike first.
After a short detour home, Sliva cycled to the fire station, where almost no one was present.
But the fax machine was overflowing with alarm notes.
Sliva sorted them first.
Penzberger Wehr also arrived
The first to arrive was a fire brigade from Königsdorf led by district fire chief Georg Dürr: “This guy is an institution,” said Sliva.
“You have to look for a long time before you find a comparable organizational talent.” Then the Penzberg fire department came and the village was divided into six sectors.
“It quickly became clear to us that we had no control over the Kloster sector,” reported the commander.
The tasks were assigned to a company, and district fire officer Erich Zengerle took over the management of operations.
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The first emergency roofs came from Munich
The first emergency roofs arrived from Munich on Sunday.
It became clear “that everything depends on turntable ladders”.
Ultimately, ten turntable ladders were available, the majority from the Munich district.
The sandbag filling plant was put into operation in Bad Tölz.
The tarpaulins were attached to the roofs with the sandbags.
Sliva: “You can’t believe how much material you need for such an operation.” The food supply was transferred to a catering service.
“If we had set fixed meal times, it would have made the operation slow.”
External emergency services then created a list of priorities: “It is better if people from outside the area say: What is broken in your place is not that important.
That is priority three,” explained Sliva.
“If our own people did that, it would have caused a lot of discussion in the village.”
Eventually there was a big “cut” and the firefighters withdrew from repairing the damage: “We can’t keep sealing holes and attaching tarpaulins for weeks.” That’s why a 24-hour citizen hotline was set up.
The fire brigade leadership and Mayor Anton Ortlieb went through the town and inspected the damage: “Most of the problems could then be solved without the fire brigade.”
In his own words, Sliva has experienced all kinds of reactions: from total helplessness to demands that the fire department take on repair work: “Someone complained that his window wasn't sealed the way he imagined.
He asked us to come for follow-up work.
It was then explained to him why we didn’t do that.”