Experienced firefighters will also experience the extent of the destruction caused by the flood up close.
Allershausen's commanding officer reports.
Allershausen
- When four men from the Allershausen volunteer fire brigade set out for Ahrweiler (Rhineland-Palatinate) on Sunday afternoon, they did not know what to expect. “Of course we saw the pictures on television,” says Commander Friedrich Moser, who drove to the flood disaster area with Markus Lachner, Alexander Huber and his son, Friedrich Moser junior. The very images of destruction that have been present in all media since last week, images that only give an idea of how devastating the situation on site really is.
Last week, Navis called the fire brigades to help with donations in kind - Allershausen got in touch immediately.
And at the same time, Commander Friedrich Moser offered to be able to provide help on site.
"That was immediately accepted with thanks," he says.
And so the people of Allershausen packed their vehicle with fire-fighting equipment and set off.
Their mission: to support navigation systems in setting up a water supply on site (we reported).
+
The team of helpers from Allershausen with (from left) fire chief Friedrich Moser, Friedrich Moser jun., Markus Lachner and Alexander Huber.
© FFW Allershausen
The helpers from the Freising district arrived on Sunday at midnight. “It was already dark by then, and we didn't see the full extent of the catastrophe until the next day,” says Moser. To experience how people stand in front of nowhere, in front of their destroyed houses, the ruins of their existence - "I really had goosebumps the whole time, we were really shocked at the extent of the disaster." And also when the 13 helpers left District worked independently, if the construction of a water supply was done exclusively with the volunteers from Navis, the group came very close to the people who were hit so hard. "We were right in the middle of it all, talked to people - and were extremely grateful," reports Moser. The appreciation ofAccording to Moser, the fact that a team from Bavaria came to help was huge. And the support from the civilian population, from people from the area who were spared, was enormous. "Cars drove up there all the time, people took their rubber boots, shovels and buckets out of the trunk and went into the houses that were still standing to shovel mud." arrived home on Wednesday at 3 a.m. As Moser emphasizes, they brought with them the knowledge "that in Germany, too, much more is possible with natural disasters than was previously believed". The helpers were also thoughtful that the extent of the destruction apparently did not seem to have really reached those affected.Despair was only marginally noticeable, the people in this exceptional situation "are primarily working", are still in shock.
Friedrich Moser is happy that he and his three colleagues did not have to take a vacation for this assignment, but were given leave by their employers.
That is not a matter of course, because the assignment was on a voluntary basis, so there is no legal right to exemption.
Freising newsletter: Everything from your region!
Our brand new Freising newsletter informs you regularly about all the important stories from the Freising region - including all the news about the corona crisis in your community.
Sign up here.