WARSAW, Poland (news agencies) — Soldiers dropped sandbags from military helicopters to reinforce river embankments and evacuated residents as the worst flooding in years spread Tuesday to a broad swath of Central Europe, taking lives and destroying homes.
Heavy flooding has affected a large part of the region in recent days, including the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Austria. There have been at least 17 deaths reported in the flooding, which follow heavy rainfall across the region.
Other places are now bracing for the flood waves, including two Central European gems: Budapest, the Hungarian capital on the Danube River, and Wroclaw, a city in southwestern Poland on the Oder River, its old town filled with architectural treasures.
Hungary’s government of Prime Minister Viktor Orbán deployed soldiers to reinforce barriers along the Danube, and thousands of volunteers assisted in filling sandbags in dozens of riverside settlements.
In Budapest, authorities closed the city’s lower quays, which are expected to be breached by rising waters later Tuesday. The lower half of the city’s iconic Margaret Island was also closed.
In Wroclaw, firefighters and soldiers spent the night using sandbags to reinforce river embankments. The city zoo, located along the Oder, appealed for volunteers to fill sandbags on Tuesday morning.
“We and our animals will be extremely grateful for your help,” the zoo said in its appeal.
The city said it expected the flood wave to peak there around Friday, though some had predicted that would happen sooner. Poland’s Prime Minister Donald Tusk met with a crisis team early Tuesday and said there are contradictory forecasts from meteorologists.
Tusk’s government has declared a state of natural disaster across southern Poland.
