Rising waters ravage north Moravia

By Wency Leung and Radka Zítková

Staff Writers

Nový Jičín, north Moravia

Marie Macíčková braved the heavy rain as she crossed the road from her tiny, gray house to check how high the waters from the swollen Jičínka River had risen.

The current pulled at the trees along the riverbank, and, alarmed by how rapidly the river was rising, the 77-year-old widow hurriedly retreated for shelter.

By the time she reached her doorstep, the water already swirled around her ankles. Once Macíčková made her way inside, a massive wave - seemingly from out of nowhere - crashed down against her walls, pouring water and mud through the windows. The force of the current ripped her door from its hinges and carried it away.

Dark, dirty water flooded the interior, surrounding her and sweeping her furniture up around her shoulders.

"Everything was floating on the water," she recalled two days later, as her two adult grandsons heaved all her sodden, destroyed belongings outside into a trash heap. "It was really horrible. You have to live it to believe it."

Sudden flooding on the evening of June 24 claimed 10 lives and left dozens homeless in north Moravia, in the country's worst natural calamity since 2002, when floods killed 17 and submerged parts of Prague. Further flooding in south Bohemia June 27 and 28 raised the death toll to 13, and officials warned of more heavy rain to come, especially around the south Bohemia towns of Písek and Husinec. Hundreds were reportedly forced to leave their homes.

In Nový Jičín, town officials issued a "status of danger" alert, urging residents to beware of flash floods and to assist those who had lost their homes. On the evening of June 24, river levels rose nearly a meter above normal.

Meanwhile, in Prague June 28, officials announced they would erect anti-flood barriers along parts of the Vltava River, and boat traffic was rerouted as a precautionary measure. City officials, however, stressed that the river was not expected to overflow.

Tomáš Klos, director of the Moravian-Silesian regional fire department in Nový Jičín, said the villages in his district were among the hardest hit last week, with some residents stranded for hours on their rooftops June 24, waiting for help to arrive.

Klos suspected that the large fields around the Jičínka River valley were unable to sustain the sudden downpour, which accumulated into a huge torrent of water that rushed through the area as quickly as it came. By the next morning, the water had subsided, but Klos estimated it could take several months to clean up and repair the devastation left in its wake.

Hundreds of firefighters and military troops were dispatched throughout the Nový Jičín area to remove fallen trees and clear blocked roads June 25 and 26. The Moravian-Silesian fire department also organized roving teams of psychologists to offer assistance to traumatized flood victims, while volunteers staffed emergency centers to provide clean bottled water, clothing, shovels and other tools.

In all, damages nationwide are expected to exceed 5.6 billion Kč ($302 million).

At the local kindergarten on Nový Jičín's Beskydská street, which was transformed into an emergency shelter, volunteer Simona Adamcová, 43, said the outpouring of charity from the community was overwhelming. Fellow residents were donating boxes of clothes, food and other materials for flood victims, while some had even taken it upon themselves to deliver homemade soup door to door.

"[The community response] is unbelievable. It makes me want to cry. It makes you recognize who is a friend when you're in need," Adamcová said. "It's completely different when you see [the flooding] on TV, and then you come here and you see [the devastation for yourself]."

Down the road from the kindergarten, Anna Honešová, 75, and her husband Jan Honeš, 78, said they had been forced to throw out most of their belongings, including all their clothing, which was destroyed by the filthy water that overtook their home.

Among an untold number of animals swept away by the flood, the couple also lost their 3-year-old German shepherd Ben. Honeš said he had tried to venture out to find him during the storm, but was knocked over by a huge wave as he attempted to leave his front yard.

"Neighbors said they saw [Ben] swimming down the road," Honeš said. "I heard they found five or six dead dogs near the river. He must have drowned."

The couple said they were temporarily living with relatives while their daughters and grandchildren helped them clear out the debris and separate whatever was salvageable in their home of nearly 64 years.

Back at Macíčková's house, however, there was barely anything left worth saving. The carpets and furniture had to be removed as they were caked in wet mud, and Macíčková was left near tears as she surveyed the damage inside her damp, empty, fetid-smelling house.

Macíčková said she scrambled to the upper loft in her house when the wave submerged the ground floor. Later that evening, firefighters arrived to bring her and her neighbors to safety, but she declined, preferring to wait out the flood.

"I thought, 'Whatever happens, happens,' " she said, noting that she refused to leave her home of 53 years. "I wanted to stay here. I want to end my life here."

Her grandson Bronislav Bača, 36, shrugged when asked of the family's plans to rebuild.

"I don't know what tomorrow will bring," he said. "We have no plan. We have no way to run away. We're just nervous and stressed. All we can do is sit and wait."

The writers can be reached at news@praguepost.com