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Garmisch-Partenkirchen entrepreneur sends four employees to the disaster area: mud, suffering and disaster tourists

2021-07-27T06:15:59.123Z


The Garmisch-Partenkirchen entrepreneur Georg Maurer organizes flood relief for the flooded district of Ahrweiler in Rhineland-Palatinate. What his four employees experience is terrifying: endless suffering, stinking mud and disaster tourists.


The Garmisch-Partenkirchen entrepreneur Georg Maurer organizes flood relief for the flooded district of Ahrweiler in Rhineland-Palatinate.

What his four employees experience is terrifying: endless suffering, stinking mud and disaster tourists.

Garmisch-Partenkirchen - The 70-year-old man on a devastated street in Ahrweiler looked desperate when Uwe Ehlert drove past with the road sweeper. Whether he could do anything for him, asked Ehlert, who spent four days as a volunteer in the disaster area in Rhineland-Palatinate. The answer came hesitantly: “Can you talk to me for five minutes? Otherwise I'll go into the cellar and hang myself up, ”said the man. He had lost everything, his house was destroyed, his belongings were washed away by the flood.

Ehlert stopped and spoke to the man, who began to cry uncontrollably, for much longer than five minutes.

The senior was shocked by the force of nature that stole his property, making him homeless.

What little he still had in the basement - a steam jet and tools - was also stolen from him.

Ehlert listened to the man, tried to console him.

"I was definitely able to help him," says the 45-year-old, who belonged to a quartet of volunteers that started out in Garmisch-Partenkirchen and was involved in the clean-up work in the disaster area on the Ahr.

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Unimaginable: rubbish in all streets.

© Private

The flood relief organization was organized by Georg Maurer. The 37-year-old runs an excavator and haulage company in the district. Three of his employees - Sebastian Schober, Thomas Niebauer and Andreas Vianden - immediately agreed to help the flood victims. Ehlert, the fourth in the group, comes from Planegg-Krailling and is responsible for occupational safety at Maurer's company. Maurer and Ehlert felt called: "We wanted to go up there and help them," says the company boss, who actually wanted to join in, but was then busy with work in the local flood area in the Wetterstein Mountains and in the Partnach Gorge.

Last Thursday morning, the convoy left the Werdenfelser Land.

“We have the equipment,” says Maurer, who made sure that emergency power generators, spare wheels, buckets, shovels and brooms were transported to the disaster area.

For this purpose, pumps and sweepers were hoisted onto the trucks and low-loaders.

While the employees from Maurer's company in the district of Bachem were out and about with excavators and trucks, Ehlert took care of the main traffic routes, front gardens and ditches in Ahrweiler with the sweeper.

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Consequences of the flood: a car in the mud.

© Private

The residents of the crisis region were more than grateful, but: "The mills grind very slowly up there," regrets Maurer. Ehlert, who witnessed the plight of the people up close for four days, can confirm this: “In the disaster area, aid is organized haphazardly.” When tens of students and office workers came to help over the weekend, it was counterproductive. “They hindered everything. They poured the mud into the gullies that we cleared beforehand. "

Ehlert saw “completely sick pictures”: tons of rubbish in landfills, hundreds of cars in the dirt. The 45-year-old describes what can be seen on television as harmless. "The media do not show the real damage that the water causes." Ehlert has seen tons of mud, the stench still in his nose. “Unimaginable,” he says. Another negative side effect: the disaster tourists. They drive to the unfortunate region, take photos and film the tragedy. "And if you need something, you can take it with you," reports Ehlert. He drove away some of these gawkers himself.

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2021-07-27

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