notamermaid

It almost certainly is the Tor, seeing that she is docked in this photo with a police car on the embankment: https://www.pnp.de/lokales/stadt-und-landkreis-passau/schiff-faehrt-bei-passau-gegen-felsen-zwei-passagiere-verletzt-11163713 Trying to dock at Lindau (part of Passau) the ship got too close to the side of the river and hit a rock. Although the damage is high, I reckon mostly due to the fact that a technical appliance in the engine room was dislodged, the hull is safe enough for the ship to continue its journey. Unfortunately, cruisemapper is not always accurate. Comparing that site with the info on vesselfinder and marinetraffic is helpful - or sometimes more confusing! The tricky bit can be the loss of terrestrial signal along stretches of the rivers. It then appears as if several ships are in one spot. Good example is Boppard on the Rhine where a bulk of ships usually "is affixed" to the map as the signal disappears at that bend in the Rhine Gorge. The actual ships "reappear" just after Rüdesheim. That is if you look in the upstream direction. notamermaid

The Pieter van der Wees with her highly unusual cargo is docking in Duisburg for the night. This is the pushboat and the company with the fleet, based in Dordrecht: https://www.vanderwees.nl/en/expertises/watertransporten/materieel/ Tomorrow the pushboat will dock at the "Bastei" in Cologne. notamermaid

Thanks for saying hello. June is a lovely month to be on the river, normally both weather and river levels are settled. Historical hydrology data is very favourable. And you have plenty of daylight of course. notamermaid

Maxau gauge stands at 668cm and looks to be going down again, ever so slightly though. Little rain is forecast, the river will likely stay high but should fall a little below official flooding status (650cm). Kaub level is still rising and predicted to peak on Sunday without reaching flooding status. notamermaid

The Danube at Kelheim is on flood mark I, as well as at Vilshofen. The Isar river past Munich is on flood mark I. That means there is a lot of water still coming from this big tributary and from the Bavarian Upper Danube as well. Passau level has peaked and is down to 665cm but with that high volume of water still coming the river could well rise again. The forecast does not suggest figures above 700cm though. notamermaid

My pleasure. Oh, and I very much like Passau. Came down a road and round the corner in the car and there it was! Not necessarily love at first sight, but certainly "wow, must check out this place in detail" at first sight. Loved the café next to the Dom. Would very much like to visit Passau again. notamermaid

Brief news: accident on the Danube of a river cruise sailing under Swiss flag and with 190 passengers. Two injured, damage to ship amounting to over 100,000 euros. Report from BR radio/television station in Bavaria: https://www.br.de/nachrichten/bayern/schiffsunfall-auf-der-donau-zwei-verletzte-hoher-sachschaden,Te2nNdX Edit: Another report discloses that it is a Viking river cruise ship. notamermaid

Here is the website with docking locations and planned dockings at Passau: https://www.stadtwerke-passau.de/hafen/liegeplatzeinteilung.html Note that Lindau has been cut and inserted into the map, the place is 2.5km from Passau old town. Remember, dockings can change at short notice. notamermaid

This is how the official website writes it: You see it reads "manche" - some. At 780cm river traffic seizes. Passau is now at 670cm. notamermaid

Yes, it appears that what we call a "Tiefdruckrinne" is giving Bavaria and Austria a band of persistent bad or at least unsettled weather for several days. It is coming from the Southeast of Europe rather than the West and Britain, where most of our German weather is made, actually the Atlantic but we usually get what Britain and the Netherlands get. Austria does not look too bad to me as regards water levels yet. And the ship could avoid the low bridge at Passau by docking downstream at Lindau or Engelhartszell. A short bus ride. Provided of course your ship is not upstream from Passau now. But, not every ship has a problem with the bridge at 630cm automatically. Have a great cruise. notamermaid

This is the official French website for flooding vigilance: https://www.vigicrues.gouv.fr/ I cannot help you with details but the colours used are a hint. As I write, the Rhine - East of Strasbourg on the map - is on yellow, that is mild flooding. notamermaid

According to Binnenschifferforum the U-Boot 17 is on a pontoon pushed by the boat "Pieter van der Wees". It has left Dordrecht and will anchor at Nijmegen overnight. notamermaid

Maxau has risen to 661cm and is on official flooding. This is what it looks like on the alert map, a blinking letter H: It is still not dramatic and the level most likely to stay below 700cm. Kaub should rise to 360cm on Saturday and although being high looks likely to stay below the flood mark I of 460cm, which is the relevant figure for river traffic. notamermaid

Hope your river cruise and trip overall will be fabulous. What an adventure to book at short notice and travel as far as you will do. Drop us a line here from somewhere on the rivers if you have time and feel like it. notamermaid

Pfelling has risen to 505cm, flood mark I is at 580cm. Passau went for the top end of the margin that was suggested in the forecast, so has risen very fast and instead of being around 620cm no stands at 648cm. A further rise is expected, around 670cm but the top end suggests 700cm (that is flood mark I). Parts of Bavaria still have a weather warning for prolonged and heavy rain. notamermaid

The weather front that left the Rhine area appears to be moving East slowly, meaning substantial amounts of rain are coming down this evening in most parts of Bavaria and filling the river. At Kelheim mild flooding is expected (level one, but level two is a probability). Subsequently we will see a rise further downstream which, according to the forecast issued this morning, could take Passau up to 620cm around lunchtime tomorrow and a further rise may happen. notamermaid

I tend to agree. The flood warning for the Upper Rhine valley is only on yellow, "mäßig" is the term, moderate. Not that big a deal. We will probably see river traffic needing to adjust to the situation, speed, etc. but, again, not a big deal. The level at Maxau will most likely stay below 700cm. River traffic is halted in the Upper Rhine valley at a level of 750cm at Maxau. Kaub will react accordingly. This of course means that we will have enough water to keep us going in the Rhine Gorge for weeks. Low water risk? Pushed well away into earliest the fourth week of June (according to the authorities' computers). This does not mean that there will be a risk then, it is just that the computer modelling ends at the end of the third week in June. notamermaid

Welcome to Cruisecritic. No need to panic. As RDVIK2016 has already laid out the scenario if low water does occur when you sail I do not need to add anything. Viking is very experienced with this kind of transfer (ship swap). If you would like to read about more about river cruising, check out the pinned threads by our host jazzbeau. Great info in those. Have a great cruise. notamermaid

It is a lot of water that the clouds have poured out over us today and it still has not stopped raining really. Too much for my umbrella and my leather shoes. My yard is almost swimming in water. All this has prompted an alert for the Upper Rhine valley for flooding (meaning "be forewarned"): So far this does not look to become major but the river will be high for sure. notamermaid

My pleasure. I hope nobody asks me to do the same thing now for October, gets one's head spinning. 😁 But seriously, it is interesting to recap and refresh my memory, do not want to make any wrong comments. Talking of memory, seeing that the data is only up to 2020 and 2022 is still clear in the memory, that leaves 2021 which, due to the fact that not many non-European ships sailed and there was not much activity as regards that in the thread of that year, I did not recall. So I have just checked. There was high water with actual mild flooding at Maxau at the beginning of August. The level went down but stayed pleasant until the end of October when bad fortune struck heavily with mishaps combining low water and two (!) ships having got stuck on the same gravel bank. Kaub gauge had the lowest reading on 1 November with 70cm then went back up but remained "wobbly" until rain really set in. This is the graph I posted at the end of the year: notamermaid

I have looked through the data sheets of figures for Kaub, quite interesting. There are no graphs that I can post but here is some historical data, the daily figures of two months in 2020: The data sheet, a pdf file by the Bundesanstalt für Gewässerkunde in Koblenz, shows the yearly figures (tons of different values) for Kaub. These are the level figures at the gauge in a daily average. So 185 is July 1st, 207 is July 2nd, etc. Basically, only the two digit numbers are of any relevance for indicating low water and those four below 100 in August are not that much of a concern. Below 90cm can be tricky for sailing but normally no river cruise ship stops sailing at 89cm automatically, all most all sail at a lower level, up to which one is the responsibility of the captain. I checked all other July and August figures. In the years 2008 to 2020, only 2015 (in August), 2018 (end of July and the whole of August (abysmal year)) and 2020 (August) present any figures below 100cm. On average, the months of September in that data are worse than the months of August, but not all months of September go down into the double digits, meaning those that stay above do not have low water (for river cruise ships). So, yes, last year was the odd one out, with August having been way worse than September. notamermaid PS: Submarine U17 is currently in Dordrecht, Netherlands.

I have mentioned the low bridge at Passau several times so here it is, the Luitpoldbrücke: https://structurae.net/en/structures/luitpold-bridge-1949 The river is rising again after substantial rain along the Upper Danube, upstream from Regensburg. In the next 48 hours it looks as though the level at Passau will stay well below the critical level for passing under the bridge. notamermaid

We have had downpours in the last 48 hours, more than I had expected. The river is already rising as a result but substantial flooding is not yet expected on any major river. The gauge at Maxau is almost on a "rocket trajectory" and will have risen a lot by this evening. Computer modelling for the next four days suggests mild flooding there. We will see how that goes. A marked rise at Kaub and further downstream will be seen only by tomorrow morning, i.e. the river is due to rise during the night when the wave from the Upper Rhine valley reaches the Rhine Gorge. This is the Basel data sheet with graph of current level: The river went above flood mark I this morning but has fallen again. notamermaid

Most of the low water issues are gone by beginning of December. Depending on the level in November, i.e. if the rivers end that month on a high, you could get flooding mid to end December. No way of calculating a scenario before mid November. Note that the Main has virtually no low water problems but flooding affects it like any other river. The particular problem on the Main is the low bridges which may keep the ship from sailing more than they do on the Rhine. But I have no experience of details on that. The issue on the Danube is the low bridge at Passau. Hope this helps. notamermaid

Many years ago I was staying with people who had rented their house to a film crew for a TV series (one episode). I talked to the props guy. Fascinating. We were in a room away from filming and told to be absolutely quiet (no talking, no moving of objects or walking about) when they shouted "action". Saw the production on TV much later. That felt kind of weird. notamermaid