Criminal Negligence? Authorities Failed To Heed Flood Warnings…”Let People Drown”…”Monumental System Failure”

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Harsh criticism of German authorities failing to act is mounting in the aftermath of the recent deadly floods.

Germany’s New Orleans

Many of the over one hundred people died in the recent flood disaster in Central Western Germany could have been prevented – had the responsible institutions heeded the warnings that had been already issued days in advance by the weather services.Authorities had been warned days early, yet they did nothing to prepare to evacuate and mobilize resources. The media did nothing to warn.

Veteran meteorologist: “much could have been prevented”

Swiss meteorologist Jörg Kachelmann told in a PULS 24 interview that “much of it could have been prevented” and that “people could have been warned”.

“The rainfall could not have been prevented” but the authorities and the “media could have warned the population.” The veteran Swiss meteorologist is surprised by the “surprise of the authorities” and says “people could have been evacuated or at least items moved to higher floors”.

“Let people drown” as “they broadcast shit”

Kachelman also commented to Germany’s leading national daily, Bild: “It hurts when the very people who would have the resources to accompany such a weather situation 24/7 do nothing to save lives. But they broadcast shit and let people drown.”

Unpreparedness becoming a German habit

Publicist Roland Tichy at tichyseinblick.de commented on what seems to be a state of permanent paralysis among the authorities: “Those who blame the flood disaster on the climate are arguing cynically: It is a matter of concrete responsibility and concrete measures and solutions. And so every weather hits Germany unprepared.”

Warnings already days in advance

Online FOCUS magazine here reported authorities claimed the flood came suddenly, and so it was impossible to prepare. Bur Jan Schenk from “The Weather Channel” told FOCUS that warnings began to appear already late last week:

Already on Friday, a heavy precipitation event was announced in western Germany. The weather models swung so strongly that one could already speak of severe weather due to heavy rain. By Monday at the latest, it must have been clear to everyone that there would be flooding in western Germany.”

“Monumental system failure”

FOCUS added:

The European EFAS flood warning system had even issued a warning of ‘extreme flooding.’ The fact that so many people still had to die was ‘a monumental system failure,’ British hydrologist Hannah Cloke, an EU Commission adviser on EFAS, told the political magazine Politico.”

Belgium and the Netherlands both evacuated citizens.

Climate change to deflect attention from failure

Meanwhile science editor Axel Bojanowski at “Welt” commented on claims that the flood was caused by German CO2 emissions: “The climate argument is used by politicians to deflect attention from their own responsibility for a disaster. Records show flash floods are less dangerous than before despite climate change.”

Building in a natural flood zone!

Another suspected problem not getting the needed attention is reckless planning and zoning. At Twitter, Stefan S. astutely noted that the hard hit town of Altenau in Rhineland Palatinate appears to have been built on an area that is a natural flood area of the Ahr River, satellite photos suggest:

Germany becoming increasingly paved over

Another major factor contributing to flash flooding is the amount of Germany’s surface area that is made impervious (paved over). A total of 19,743 km² (5.5%) of the country’s surface area is paved.

The recent German floods turned out to be where Germany is the most paved over, as the following chart shows. The colors shows the degree to which the surface is paved over:

Source: Leibnitz Institute

Deadliest floods occurred before 1980

Finally, climate alarmists like insisting that flooding today is far worse than before CO2 emissions reached higher levels (350+ppm). But of course this is nonsense. The 30 most deadly floods in the last 1000 years all occurred before 1980: