notamermaid

Can I just say that I am a dainty woman who is not really into cars, but I am envious! 😁 Beats the McClaren I saw the other day. notamermaid

Lock situation back to normal it seems, ship that was blocking the lock at Wallsee last night is gone. Work boats and patrol are in the German Danube section (Pfelling) checking the navigation channel and presumably adjusting or replacing buoys. That area is not fit for sailing for commercial traffic yet according to the authorities. notamermaid

No major change to forecast. Now that we are getting closer to when the wave is supposed to be in Maxau the forecast becomes even more reliable. The rise should happen during the afternoon and into the evening with the 750cm coming tomorrow morning. Now we can assume that the line will inevitably be crossed (with miniscule chance of it staying below). Likely range of figures 760cm to 775cm. Lake Constance experiencing real problems, the level has gone up to 505cm. Figure of 512cm denotes a flood that happens every ten years. notamermaid

In brief: situation on the German Danube still difficult. Level rising again at Kelheim. Indication of an incident at a lock in Austria. Traffic build-up showing late last night on marinetraffic. Not sure if situation resolved. notamermaid

I am getting some ideas here of where I could put any money I win a lottery. Must say that I am more a fan of steam engines but a nice old car or a modern good design I appreciate. Borgward or a nice old Mercedes. Opel had a good one in the Fifties. Or an British car. Got a few clubs here in the Rhineland organising events and rallies. Will try and go to one. notamermaid

Tricky situation. We have mentioned the chamber at Iffezheim lock. Traffic is slower than normal per flooding regulations. The river is just very high still. It really may make sense to have passengers board in Strasbourg or Speyer or even Mannheim, depending on where you want your ship to be in the next few days. Rastatt is here (Plittersdorf actually, in the administrative district of the town I think): The yellow dot near Karlsruhe is Maxau. So if the ship arrives at Rastatt tomorrow it may need to stop there, or make a mad dash through Iffezheim lock which is nearby but upstream. I have had a look at Maxau gauge forecast. It looks a little better but I very much still see the risk of a river traffic ban, although most likely it will not be for long. Things should be clearer by tomorrow afternoon. notamermaid

A really small port. I wonder if it means that there is indeed a problem at Budapest? Or downstream? Or just TUI? I have read no reports other than that the lower embankment is closed. The flooding is slowly leaving Budapest, the river has peaked there. The wave is still in Hungary, this is Paks, near where the TUI Skyla is docked: notamermaid

The Skyla? What happened there? She is in the middle of (Danube river) nowhere in Hungary?? She was hit by the flooding on the Rhine in December by the way and CC reported on it as an editor was on board at the time. I got it wrong by the way, the Isla had her next itinerary scheduled for Friday, not Saturday. Sorry. https://www.ttgmedia.com/cruise/rising-water-levels-force-tui-river-cruises-to-evacuate-ship-46782 notamermaid

I did not see that one coming although at the time I posted it was clear that things were not quite right. The NB212 being taken alongside the MS Insomnia, as of tonight, is still at the railway bridge at Bogen! That is more than a week now, I wonder if that will cause problems for the shipyard in the Netherlands. notamermaid

Like quite a few other ships will not get to or have got to where they are or were supposed to be. The disruption to itineraries is substantial. Ship swaps really only work (to passengers comfort I may add) if you have enough ships being in good locations. A long complete closure of the Danube in Germany and a short part time closure in Austria is BIG. And then we had the Rhine - and the low bridges on the Main... In theory, you can of course do a ship swap of a ship on the Main Danube Canal and in Linz on the Danube, but who wants to travel 200odd km by coach? In that way flooding is a bigger problem on the Danube than low water. That is normally only a quick coach ride between Regensburg and Vilshofen (shortest usual version). And if necessary a quick coach ride into Budapest from Komarom. But to the good news: ships are moving between Straubing and Kelheim as the ban was lifted earlier! So the lucky Viking Idi, having been in the harbour at Straubing, is able to go to Regensburg. This means of course that the Avalon Impression can move as well. But if her itinerary is completely out of sync there may no be no point in moving tonight of course. Straubing to Passau I am afraid has not been given the go ahead by the authorities. This means that the TUI Isla will remain in Deggendorf. notamermaid

That really looks better, doesn't it? notamermaid

There is one more ship still tied up where it should not be and that is the Avalon Impression: She got stranded at Kelheim and is as you can see on the Altmühl. Confused? That is actually the Main Danube Canal which at this point is the engineered Altmühl river. The Danube is coming from the left in this screenshot. German regional news picked up the topic and says that the ship had gone through the lock on Sunday morning (2nd of June) and then was told that traffic on the Danube had just been banned, so they had to stop in Kelheim. The passengers were supposed to be taken off the ship during the day and then presumably taken to Linz. https://www.mittelbayerische.de/lokales/landkreis-kelheim/flusskreuzfahrtschiff-strandet-hinter-kelheimer-schleuse-prognostizierter-scheitel-wurde-nach-oben-korrigiert-16167153 The situation has improved now of course. It has been a long week for the Impression but she will soon be able to sail again. notamermaid

I had posted the article and looked at the photo, my brain just registering two ships, a barge and a river cruise ship docked near a bridge. Then on the second look it did not look "standard". A river cruise ship and barge together does not happen that often - it is an unusual flooding situation - but on top of that something looked odd. Then I noticed that it is not a river cruise ship but a hull. As you spotted @Canal archive, there is no wheelhouse. Having posted about it before it was then clear: it must be the MS Insomnia with the hull NB212 coming from Serbia. The barge and precious cargo got stranded at a bridge on the Danube. Details are in the Danube thread. I checked - the bridge is the infamous railway bridge at Bogen. And as of now the duo is still tied up together at the bridge it seems: A river cruise ship delayed by flooding before it is even a river cruise ship! notamermaid

Ah yes. I am not familiar with the port of Basel so cannot say much about that. There has been mention of a low bridge and rearranged docking positions in the past. Likewise the situation may affect the Grand Canal (French Rhine section) a little. I see the bigger problem in Germany. A river traffic ban would make Karlsruhe harbour and Germersheim difficult to reach or inaccessible. It is just that you create a cut/interruption in any itinerary that goes from either Basel or Strasbourg downriver or makes you stop at Germersheim (I think) not being allowed further upstream. A regards a river traffic ban extending to the other official sections downstream, it does not look substantial enough to cause problems there. So I would say at the moment it looks as if Speyer should be okay and Worms downstream to the Netherlands should be fine. notamermaid

I think we need a nifty, inventive, idea to combine a (river) cruise with an adorable car. Working on it. notamermaid

Power is the crucial word here. That is close. Correct. The white ship has no wheelhouse, hence no steering - and no power. Well spotted. Explanation to follow. notamermaid

Thank you for your kind words. A great trip through Europe and I am sure you took home fantastic memories, perhaps a few souvenirs as well. Perhaps someone is interested: the river levels were good at that time last year, the figures at Pfelling were just right but went low shortly after. I thought I would make a timeline from the brilliant service of the Bavarian authorities with your Danube cruise week and the corresponding cruise week of this year, together with the year in between the two. Look at the vast difference: For a rough guide you can take a ruler and place it from on top a little below the 300cm, where the line is still visible below that, i.e. creating a white space, is a level that was likely too low for a large river cruise ship. Slide a ruler from the bottom of the graph upwards and everything that is still visible a bit over 600cm was probably affected by a river traffic ban. That kicks in on paper at 620cm at Pfelling. Pfelling is now at 647cm and painfully slowly receding. notamermaid

The crosses have been put in all sorts of places on paper in all sorts of colours and a lot of people will have a busy evening and busy Monday. Local elections are a lot of work to count. Posters will soon disappear from towns and cities. Where they will remain "for posterity" [pun unintended] is - in videos of flooding. Yesterday I watched a video of the river Neckar and there along the embankment road were the posters on lampposts. On the Rhine, well, we still have official flooding, at Lake Constance, at Hauenstein and at Maxau gauge. The Swiss levels are a bit different from the German way of doing it but for us for river cruising the most important one is the figure at Maxau gauge. After a dip during the day the river level has gone up again, is now at 721cm and forecast to rise to 740cm during the course of tomorrow. The 750cm will almost inevitably happen in due course. notamermaid

Okay, I missed this at first, I have just noticed something about the photo in the article. I have taken the liberty of cropping it. Can you spot what I mean when I say there is something unusual about these two ships? notamermaid

AmaWaterways will add two ships to their fleet in 2026, one for the Mekong and one for the Rhine/Danube: https://travelweekly.co.uk/news/tour-operators/amawaterways-to-add-two-ships-to-fleet-in-2026 notamermaid

The Avalon Imagery II is in Schwabelweiß: Passau gauge may react to today's rain with a small rise on Monday. notamermaid

Lake Constance is rising further and the Swiss authorities have now put in on their respective flood level 4. Problems are starting with low bridges, debris, inaccessible landing stations and more difficult navigation. Basel gauge is indicating a fast rise in volume of water the river has to deal with. Time frame suggests that this is what will drive the rise at Maxau gauge indicated for Monday. So we can say that the modelling for the Upper Rhine valley in Germany looks to be correct. notamermaid

One ship I had not noticed before is the Viking Idi, she is in Straubing. Her destination was last updated on 1 June, so I guess she has been in the spot since then: And for brief comparison to 2013, here is the river level at Passau as of now: 811cm. In 2013 on 8 June at this time the level was at 784cm. As I said in a previous post, the river peaked on the 5th of June in both years. In 2013 it had dropped from a far higher level and was lower than we are seeing it now, so we can clearly see that the water takes longer to leave the German Danube. I had got the impression that this was the case and read a weather reporter mentioning it this morning, so I checked the figures. On the Rhine things are good for now, but the Upper Rhine valley is facing a potential river traffic ban again. The wave will not be very high and most likely not cause major problems at the gauging stations downstream from and including Mannheim. notamermaid

Wasn't there something about a ship supposed to be in Frankfurt today, Saturday? I really nearly forgot that, so much has been happening. The stricken TUI Isla, as you can guess, is still in Deggendorf. She is not the only ship still stranded on the Danube in Germany of course. Levels are starting to fall below HSW, the highest permitted level for river traffic, but the authorities are not yet allowing river traffic to resume anywhere, according to the information service for river traffic. It sounds as if this will be done in one, i.e. when all the gauges have fallen to the permitted level. The wording by the authorities as of today, valid till 11am tomorrow: notamermaid

From what I read online in German, not many people are worried about it as it is manageable, but we need to note that it is raining quite bit over Southern Germany today. What could it mean for the Danube? Some tributaries are still draining a higher than normal volume of water into the river and the Upper Danube, i.e. German Upper, is still relatively high. The reaction of the Danube will come fast, but as of now this will not create a peak of sorts. What we can say is that draining the Danube catchment area will take longer with any substantial amount of rain that falls. It may mean that the river cruise ships will be stuck for a few hours longer than if it did not rain. Right now though the relevant gauges are still showing declining levels. At Donauwörth on the really young Danube the level is set to rise. At Ingolstadt and Kelheim the improved graphs may level by tomorrow evening and not go down. At Passau, improvement hour on hour is now slow. Rain clouds are moving over the Isar and Inn tonight with substantial rain hitting the border area with Austria near Salzburg. Upper Austria has ended flood warning on the official page but notes that the levels will stay very high and there is rain forecast. The levels may rise again and the authorities will stay vigilant. It looks as if Austria, apart from the joint Danube with Germany, is fully open to river traffic. Budapest gauge looks to have reached its peak and should start falling during the night. The improved map of Bavaria: notamermaid