After the storms in the Gelände valley and Upper Carinthia, in which water in particular caused massive destruction, Carinthia’s fire brigades had to move out 640 times on Thursday, especially in the east of the country, due to storm damage. “Trees on the streets and covered houses were the main problems in the districts of St. Veit, Feldkirchen, Völkermarkt and in the Lavanttal,” says the state alarm and warning center. Across Carinthia, 172 fire brigades with around 2,500 emergency services had to be deployed following the storms.
The work – especially securing covered roofs – continued for them on Friday. Even if there is great dismay there following two girls (3, 8) passed through the St. Andräer See leisure center on Thursday falling trees were killed.
Even for Christian Stefan, meteorologist at the Central Institute for Meteorology and Geodynamics (Zamg) the storm phenomenon on Thursday was anything but ordinary: “Every minute the wind increased from 70, 80 to more than 100 kilometers per hour. The high-level wind was very strong on Thursday, and the massive thunderstorm line mixed it into the thunderstorm .” A precise analysis of the weather situation on Thursday will be carried out by the weather experts.
1000 households still without electricity
The massive storm also caused problems for the Carinthia network. Up to 20,000 households were without electricity on Thursday evening. And even on Saturday there are still 1000 households, as reported by Robert Schmaranz from Kärnten Netz. The work turned out to be difficult and dangerous. “Over the night of Sunday, around 300 households remain without supplies,” says Schmaranz. The focus is on the Hüttenberg area and the Metnitztal. The army is in the assistance operation.
Scheduled train service
After the complete failure of train traffic on Thursday, train traffic on the southern route is now working as planned once more. There are no longer any problems with local transport either.
Enormous damage in agriculture
The catastrophic storm also caused extensive damage to agriculture in the south. According to hail insurance, the districts of Wolfsberg and Völkermarkt were particularly affected in Carinthia. According to the first estimate, the damage in agriculture amounts to one million euros. Film and glass houses, fruit and wine under netting systems and corn were damaged by the hurricane-force storm.
