VISNOVA, Czech Republic — Floods in eastern Romania killed at least four people and damaged thousands of homes on Saturday, authorities said, as days of torrential rains caused rising river levels and put authorities in much of Central and Eastern Europe on high alert.
Tens of thousands of homes were left without power in Romania and the Czech Republic, and more rain is expected in the coming days, along with heavy rainfall in Poland, Slovakia, Hungary, southern Germany and parts of Austria.
Residents of several towns along the Czech-Polish border were evacuated after river levels exceeded warning levels, while preventive flood control measures were put in place in the Czech capital, Prague, which was hit by devastating floods in 2002.
In Romania, floods affected eight counties, the country’s emergency department said, and Prime Minister Marcel Ciolac visited hard-hit Galati county, where four people were killed, about 5,000 homes were damaged and 25,000 homes lost power.
Television footage from the scene showed roads flooded with muddy water, silt and debris as rescue teams guided residents to safety.
“The first priority is obviously saving lives, and at this point we have all the logistics in place to intervene quickly,” Ciolak said.
Evacuation and power outages
The north and northeast of the Czech Republic were hardest hit by floods, with 51,000 homes left without electricity, the CTK news agency reported.
Forecasters warned that some parts of the country could receive more than a third of the annual average rainfall by Sunday, and Environment Minister Petr Hladic urged residents in the worst-hit areas to prepare to evacuate.
Roman Kristof, a local resident of the village of Visnova, 87 miles north of Prague, said his house was spared because it was built on higher ground. Others were not so lucky, he added.
“I feel sorry for the neighbors,” he said, looking out over the floodwaters.
In Prague, a city of more than 1.3 million people located on the Vltava River and spanned by the beautiful 14th-century Charles Bridge, flood barriers have been erected.
The city invested heavily in prevention measures after a 2002 flood that inundated the subway system and forced tens of thousands of people to evacuate.
The Prague Zoo on the Vltava River was closed, Czech Railways said dozens of lines had been suspended, and hospitals in Brno, the Czech Republic’s second-largest city, evacuated patients as a precaution.
“An important night is coming up.”
In the historic town of Grchołady in southwestern Poland near the Czech border, firefighters piled hundreds of sandbags along a swollen river and some residents were evacuated.
Poland’s Interior Minister Tomasz Siemoniak said the weather forecast was unfavorable and that very heavy rains were expected to fall near the Czech border in the next 24 hours, causing rivers to flow into Poland.
“We are facing a momentous night and we need total mobilisation,” Prime Minister Donald Tusk said on the X platform.
Officials in neighbouring Slovakia have warned that rising waters in the Danube could flood the capital, Bratislava, while Hungary expects the river to approach its all-time high in the coming days.
In Austria, emergency services were working with district governors and municipalities to prepare for evacuations.
Prime Minister Karl Nehammer said all states were affected and the situation was particularly bad in the northeastern state of Lower Austria.
“The next few days will be extremely difficult and challenging for those affected and for emergency services,” Nehammer said on X.