Severe weather alarm in Austria: "Houses buried meters high with mud" - community completely isolated
Created: 06/29/2022, 11:14 am
By: Patrick Huljina
In Treffen am Ossiacher See, entire streets are covered with mud and flooding.
© Gert Eggenberger/dpa
Heavy rainfall and hail have led to many mudslides in Carinthia.
The civil defense alarm was raised for two municipalities.
Munich/Villach - In the night of Wednesday (June 29), severe storms raged in the Austrian state of Carinthia.
Heavy rainfall and hail resulted in numerous mudslides.
Houses were partly buried up to the first floor.
The situation is unclear.
For the communities of Treffen am Ossiach and Arriach in the Villach-Land district, the civil defense alarm was even triggered.
According to ORF, 7,500 households around Villach and in the area were still without electricity on Wednesday morning.
Severe storms in Austria: "Houses buried meters high with mud"
"It's hard to imagine.
The houses are buried meters high with mud, cars have been torn away.
People are in shock," said water rescuer Michael Siter to the Austrian news portal
Kurier
.
He has been with the water rescue service for 20 years and has never experienced anything comparable.
So far it is unclear how many injuries there are.
"We have flown out seven people and a dog so far," reported Siter.
According to the
courier
, the water rescuer was one of the emergency services that were flown to the affected areas by helicopter in the morning.
The other ways are "too dangerous" and "too muddy", according to the police.
There are also 24-hour nurses among the emergency services.
They should support people in need of care on site.
In addition, the fire brigade, mountain rescue, the army and search dogs are also deployed.
They are supposed to track down people who may have been buried.
Severe storms in Austria: civil defense alarm triggered - "hundred-year flood"
According to initial reports, the two communities of Treffen am Ossiach and Arriach in southern Austria were particularly hard hit.
A civil defense alert was raised for meetings at around 3:30 a.m., which later expanded to a civil defense alert.
According to the ORF, people were instructed to go to safety on the first floor of their houses and wait until the situation eased.
Due to the extreme rainfall, several streams burst their banks in various places.
Johannes Moser from the hydrological service spoke to the ORF of a "hundred-year flood".
Meeting Mayor Klaus Glanznig explained that a crisis team was set up.
Many roads are covered with mud and stones and are currently not passable.
Austria: Arriach cut off from the environment
A civil defense warning was also issued in the municipality of Arriach at 5:30 a.m., which was expanded to a civil defense alarm at around 6 a.m.
According to APA, Gerhard Hohenwarter from the Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics (ZAMG) said that in Arriach and other places in the region it had "rained as much in just a few hours as in an average June."
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According to ORF, Arriach is currently cut off from the environment.
The army is trying to make its way through the buried streets.
Meanwhile, police helicopters carry out reconnaissance and evacuation flights.
District captain Bernd Riepan said there were also reports of missing people.
"We're trying to get an overview of the situation with the helicopter so that we can rescue people as quickly as possible," he said.
(ph)