Danube water levels 2023 and similar topics - plus tips and info

[steamboats]

Passau has crested but there is more water coming. So there will be another rise caused by the confluencing rivers. Plus the water is still rising on the Western parts of the Danube river (which is not navigable). Neuburg an der Donau hasn´t crested yet and is still rising.

 

It´s not that bad in Passau. With a real high water that quare in front of the town hall (the recessed building with the tower) is flooded too. There are still cars parking there.

 

steamboats

[notamermaid]

Sounds a little less than expected in Passau. Still, not pleasant. The Upper Danube and the tributaries:

 

notamermaid

 

[iticlaudia]

4 hours ago, ILoveToCruiseNCL said:

Our ship, Viking Egdir, had to pull over and dock in Linz at 2:30 am when we were only half way to our destination of Melk, Austria because of the extremely rapid current on the Danube now. They are hoping to bus us to our tour of Melk Abbey in a few hours but have no idea as to what the plan for us after that will be. As it’s still raining here I don’t know if the Danube’s waters will be becoming any calmer later in the day. Our fabulous cruise director is doing the best he can but Mother Nature is fully in charge now! 

Oh wow!  We are starting our first river cruise on Sunday starting in Budapest.  Now I'm wondering how all this will affect our cruise.  Having never done a river cruise before I have no idea what to expect.  I know last year there was a tremendous drought and it caused chaos for not only cruises but also the cargo barges.  Never thought about what happens when there is too much water.  

[Daisi]

@steamboats thanks, looks like some parts are flooding. Not good.

[ILoveToCruiseNCL]

We were supposed to sail from our emergency docking port of Linz to Vienna tonight but we were just informed that the Danube is still closed for all traffic due to unsafe conditions so here we still remain since 2:30 am last night.   We will be bussed to Vienna tomorrow morning and will, with luck, be able to meet our ship, Viking Egdir, at some unknown location in the early evening as the earliest possible time that she can get to Vienna is midnight tomorrow. This part of our cruise is now flying on a wing and a prayer and I doubt that our cruise director is getting any sleep with all of the constant adjustments that need to be made because of low water and now high water. I feel really bad for Passau as he mentioned that they have flooding there now. 

[notamermaid]

22 minutes ago, ILoveToCruiseNCL said:

We were supposed to sail from our emergency docking port of Linz to Vienna tonight but we were just informed that the Danube is still closed for all traffic due to unsafe conditions so here we still remain since 2:30 am last night.

I am sorry to hear that. It is interesting as I saw the high levels on the Austrian gauges and was wondering if they ban traffic right now. It was not fully clear from the description if the levels would automatically trigger this as notices to vessels or the authorities issue the ban separately.

 

Anyway, what a task for the cruise director! Hope you are keeping in reasonable spirits and the trip to Vienna goes ahead with plan C (or whichever it may be now).

 

Passau by the way peaked at 9am this morning at a level of 797cm. It is down to 771cm now. But with much water still coming there is not much chance of the standard high river cruise ships getting under that bridge in Passau soon.

 

This is Dürnstein gauge in Austria:

So it looks as if the huge wave has moved on and for now the situation looks to be improving going into the night.

 

notamermaid

 

[TripPlanner1]

Thank you so much for keeping us up to date.

[notamermaid]

The wave is now at Dunaremete and Nagybajcs in Hungary.

 

notamermaid

 

[iticlaudia]

How does one find out how many bridges and locks are on a certain stretch of the Danube?  We are doing Budapest to Linz before going to Vienna (with stops in between).  

[steamboats]

4 hours ago, iticlaudia said:

How does one find out how many bridges and locks are on a certain stretch of the Danube?  We are doing Budapest to Linz before going to Vienna (with stops in between).  

 

The easiest way to check is actually Google Maps ;-). Anyway it doesn´t tell you how high the bridges are and whether the river is closed. But that´s actually not easy to find out.

 

Here in Munich we reached level 2 yesterday but it crested.

 

Passau for sure will have a couple of more days of ups and downs regarding the water levels. The Inn river (confluence at Passau) is carrying a lot of water coming from Austria and Bavaria. Our Isar river has a lot of water flowing down to the Danube river. The Danube river West of the navigable area has a lot of water flowing down to Passau. So there are a couple of more waves coming.

 

steamboats

[Canal archive]

Try doris.bmk.gv.at for the locks.

Edited August 30, 2023 by Canal archive

[notamermaid]

1 hour ago, Canal archive said:

Try doris.bmk.gv.at for the locks.

That is a very good website - and the official Austrian one - for many things related to the river.

 

If you want to go really deep into the topic, here is the page: https://www.danubecommission.org/dc/de/die-donauschifffahrt/bruecken-an-der-donau/

 

notamermaid

 

[notamermaid]

12 hours ago, TripPlanner1 said:

Thank you so much for keeping us up to date.

My pleasure.

 

Kelheimwinzer gauge near Regensburg is still rising and statistically on flooding status. The blue marker:

 

Regensburg and Passau will still get a lot of water. By the way, I do not know how this affects river traffic, i.e. if there is a ban. Pfelling gauge is at 608cm, so more than double what river cruise ships need. That is getting close to a level at which a ban is issued.

 

Passau is at 745cm. It looks as if this could be a kind of plateau and we cannot be certain how much the volume of water coming from Regensburg soon will keep this steady or make it rise again substantially. 630cm is the figure given that is needed for most river cruise ships to sail under the bridge. Some with a lower superstructure can of course make the passage at a higher level (as long as there is no river traffic ban).

 

The wave has reached Budapest and a level of 400cm is expected. According to the Hungarian Hydrological Forecast Service this is not considered enough flooding to reach an alert level. I have no idea when a river traffic ban is issued in Hungary.

 

notamermaid

 

 

 

[Blues51]

We're on the Viking Baldur, currently docked in Vienna on a B to A cruise.  We're due to leave tonight for Melk and then Passau.  No one of the crew has mentioned anything about a ship swap - it appears to be business as usual.  That doesn't mean that they may spring a change on us at the last minute, but so far, so good.

[notamermaid]

Kelheimwinzer has reached the plateau, Pfelling to Vilshofen gauges are rising. Passau at 739cm.

 

notamermaid

 

[steamboats]

Looks like the wave is now at Straubing...

 

steamboats

[Blues51]

On Viking Baldur, we're approaching Melk.  No public announcements, but cruise director told me Passau is flooded, not allowing ships to dock, and impassible past Passau.  But he said much can change in the 24 hours until the captain needs to make a decision.

Edited August 31, 2023 by Blues51

[Canal archive]

Is it a bit like a tidal bore as in the river Severn and Bordeaux?

[notamermaid]

54 minutes ago, Canal archive said:

Is it a bit like a tidal bore as in the river Severn and Bordeaux?

Not sure, but as I understand it the surge makes a stronger current and it just so happened that huge amounts of rain came down too fast for the ground every where to soak it up. So, 36 hours of rain over a wide area are gushing down the river in sort of 36 hours. I suppose that makes it similar in action to a tidal bore.

 

As steamboats has said, the wave has moved on and is therefore closer to Passau. This is the current situation at the gauges (special edition in the software, as the authorities watch the flooding with a new update every 15 minutes):

 

We see that Passau is at 725cm, awaiting the wave which is at Pfelling, where it has just peaked. Oberndorf further upstream is nicely on the way down again.

 

notamermaid

 

[reeves35]

I'm currently on Travelmarvel Polaris in Budapest.  We arrived from Vienna overnight and the current has definitely eased off from what it was a couple of days ago.  There are a number of ships that have departed Budapest today heading upstream so they must be confident they will be able to get through by the time they reach Passau in a few days.

 

Polaris heads back towards Amsterdam tomorrow after we disembark.  Regardless of conditions, passengers boarding tomorrow will have a ship-swap in Nuremberg next Friday where they will board Vega which was the ship we were on until the low-water ship swap last week.  Apparently this is necessary for ship positioning purposes.  Whilst a bit of a hassle, I assume the logistics will be quite easy as the ships will basically be parked next to one another and passengers luggage will be moved to their new ship whilst they are on a shore excursion.  Last week, pax from both ships had to be moved by coach between Nuremberg and Passau for the swap.

 

 

[notamermaid]

Dürnstein gauge again:

 

While it is down quite a bit, the level remains fairly high. I wonder what the new wave coming from Passau will do? That wave is at Vilshofen and will be in Passau soon.

 

Budapest, where the first wave is going through now:

As mentioned before, not too big a deal. Authorities expect the level to peak tomorrow at just under 500cm.

 

notamermaid

 

 

Edited August 31, 2023 by notamermaid

[Blues51]

Hello again from the Viking Baldur. We left Melk this afternoon and are sailing for Passau.  Our cruise director announced that they had quite a discussion about the water levels, but finally decided that we could make it upriver.  Several optional excursions from Passau are canceled, and the sun deck is closed, but the ship will continue upstream.  Yay!

[notamermaid]

56 minutes ago, Blues51 said:

but the ship will continue upstream. 

Hooray to that! I hope Passau will be very enjoyable.

 

Just as a side note - I had mentioned Kelheim. Excursion boats cannot run to Weltenburg Monastery due to the flooding. But the situation is improving fast so hopefully they can sail again soon. Pfelling peaked at 644cm and is now at 622cm.

 

That's it from me for today. Tomorrow lunchtime we should see the wave having gone through Passau and the water already having receded a little.

 

notamermaid

 

[steamboats]

All river gauges in Germany have crested by now and only two of them are showing a level 1 or 2 but falling rapidly. Passau is not on a high water level anymore but of course the river is still higher than usual. There´s still a high water warning in effect for Passau. Seems the wave is through right now.

 

steamboats

 

 

[Canal archive]

All of this conjures up some wonderfully imaginative pictures, I wonder if there’s a local cam set up that could catch it, or is that wishful thinking, I’ve never seen a river wave before except for the Severn bore.