The entire course of the Danube in Austria is closed to shipping due to flooding caused by heavy rainfall in the country and in neighboring southern Germany.
The state waterway company announced the closure via Danube on Tuesday. “Safety cannot be guaranteed above a certain water level,” Christoph Caspar, spokesperson for Via Donau, told DPA. How long the measure will remain in force depends on further rainfall and water levels in the Danube’s tributaries.
The Danube flows more than 350 kilometers through Austria, from the Bavarian border town of Passau to the Slovak capital Bratislava, also on the border.
The closure forced some cruise ships to dock in Linz, where the Danube burst its banks on Tuesday. Some roads were also closed. In Schärding, located on the River Inn, a tributary of the Danube, defenses were strengthened to prevent major flooding.
While water levels on the Bavarian Danube continued to rise across the border in Germany, slight increases were also recorded on the Upper Austrian Danube, the Hydrographic Office of Upper Austria reported on Tuesday afternoon. Overall, however, experts expected the situation to improve quickly.
