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Europe’s Most Important River Is Running Dry


TheBiscuits

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Thanks for the update.

 

There were other articles about this before Christmas.  They included the similar situation with the Danube.  One thing they featured was cruise ship issues - shallow levels preventing sailings - one cruise ship aground at Cologne - cruise companies swapping 'static' accomodation and bussing passengers to each others ships - booking local trip boats to do the Budapest illuminations cruise etc

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16 minutes ago, Grebe said:

Thanks for the update.

 

There were other articles about this before Christmas.  They included the similar situation with the Danube.  One thing they featured was cruise ship issues - shallow levels preventing sailings - one cruise ship aground at Cologne - cruise companies swapping 'static' accomodation and bussing passengers to each others ships - booking local trip boats to do the Budapest illuminations cruise etc

I suppose that if it was still there after 14 days, someone stuck a ticket on it.

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8 hours ago, TheBiscuits said:

Europe’s Most Important River Is Running Dry

The Rhine waterway, critical to moving coal, car parts, food and thousands of other goods, risks becoming impassable because of climate change.

 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-18/europe-s-most-important-river-is-running-dry

The coal and car parts will be contributing to the climate change, leading to the river running dry. If the boats can't move, then less coal and car parts and less climate change, so it should be self correcting.

3 minutes ago, Naughty Cal said:

So where has all the water gone?

CaRT volunteers going over with buckets and taking it back to fill up the reservoirs. There is an advent on the situations vacant part of the CaRT web site for a bucket chain volunteer coordination manager on £80k per annum.

 

Jen

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A few possibilities:-

 

  • hotter summers increasing evaporation;
  • warmer, wetter winters reducing snow-fall, and therefore snow-melt;
  • water management - extraction for agriculture, industry, human consumption, etc;
  • someone left a paddle up!

BTW - I have no expertise in this area, but the above seem likely candidates, except for the last one, of course.

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Hasn't it always been the case that for part of the year both the Rhine and Danube have been too low for navigation by large or heavily-loaded ships, while for other parts of the year they've been too high? One problem must be that they build ships to the maximum size that can navigate under ideal conditions, but then the conditions change with the seasons; the lower Rhine has no locks, just a long steady fall along it's length, so the upper end of that is critically dependent on the right amount of water being supplied.

 

Several friends of ours have over many years suffered from Rhine cruises being curtailed by the wrong water levels both high and low. We were extremely lucky last year to hit the critical balance where all the levels were right, to take a cruise from Amsterdam to the Black Sea (you can see my account here)

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2 hours ago, Keeping Up said:

Hasn't it always been the case that for part of the year both the Rhine and Danube have been too low for navigation by large or heavily-loaded ships, while for other parts of the year they've been too high? One problem must be that they build ships to the maximum size that can navigate under ideal conditions, but then the conditions change with the seasons; the lower Rhine has no locks, just a long steady fall along it's length, so the upper end of that is critically dependent on the right amount of water being supplied.

 

Several friends of ours have over many years suffered from Rhine cruises being curtailed by the wrong water levels both high and low. We were extremely lucky last year to hit the critical balance where all the levels were right, to take a cruise from Amsterdam to the Black Sea (you can see my account here)

The Moselle river, which feeds into the Rhine, often has very low levels, preventing navigation during the summer. The levels were apparently lower than average in 2018 and 2015, but other years appear to have had average levels.

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We were on the Danube at the end of September and had to swap between 2 ships. We were told that the Viking boats drew 2 metres but the problem section was down to 1.5 metres. Other companies were then already using their boats as static "hotels" and running their trips by coach.
Can't complain as they have given us a further discount off our next cruise on the Duoro in 2020. And thanks Allan, I have read your blog of that trip.

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There is a solution to this problem which I shall put forward my suggestion to Mrs Merkel when I have time and if she'll pay me for the phone call.  It should help with the Brexit problem from which we might even escape Scot free.  Added objects of great displacement are whats required to raise the river levels, temporarily until the rains arrive at any rate. These objects of displacement could be many things like old out of service big well balasted down big ships moored all over the shop, Old sea mines tethered on the bottom, even Hippopotomus's and buffalo  which wallow about in water could be imported from Africa and sent back after the crisis is over, but told to be on stand by in case it reoccurs.  Mr Hitler wouldn't have messed about with this little problem which would have upset his war effort,to help he would have simply directed at gun point all huge folk of bulky displacement to go swimmin in the Rhine and keep on swimmin and swimmin till the rains come.   :closedeyes:

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Usual "climate change" hype to describe effects of weather.
Historical extreme highs and lows of the Rhine:

River Situation    From          To
Rhine Low water 1947-10-01 1947-11-20
Rhine High water 1993-12-01 1994-01-15
Rhine Low water 1971-09-04 1971-11-30
Rhine Low water 2003-07-02 2003-09-02
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One statement confused me. It says that as the glaciers melt the flow reduces - I would have thought that increased glacial melt would cause greater flow .. until they disappear that is - but hey I'm no glacierologist

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2 minutes ago, KevMc said:

One statement confused me. It says that as the glaciers melt the flow reduces - I would have thought that increased glacial melt would cause greater flow .. until they disappear that is - but hey I'm no glacierologist

Perhaps the glacial melt reduces the heat of the surrounding sea, thereby reducing the melting effect?

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2 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Perhaps the glacial melt reduces the heat of the surrounding sea, thereby reducing the melting effect?

If you're a glacierologist I'll accept that :cheers: ... it even sounds good enough for an Ignobel award

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1 minute ago, KevMc said:

If you're a glacierologist I'll accept that :cheers: ... it even sounds good enough for an Ignobel award

I’m just a bloke on an iPhone. I know nothing about glaciers other than they move glacially slowly. Oh, and they’re a bit cold. 

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25 minutes ago, WotEver said:

Perhaps the glacial melt reduces the heat of the surrounding sea, thereby reducing the melting effect?

hang on ...... the glaciers that melt to put water in the rivers aren't near the sea ... they must be in the mountains .... so the water can flow down the river. If they were near the sea they would block the river from entering the sea and water levels would rise .....

 

... I knew I could be an ologist if I tried hard enuff :detective:

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4 minutes ago, KevMc said:

hang on ...... the glaciers that melt to put water in the rivers aren't near the sea ... they must be in the mountains .... so the water can flow down the river. If they were near the sea they would block the river from entering the sea and water levels would rise .....

 

... I knew I could be an ologist if I tried hard enuff :detective:

Oh yeah. Scrub that idea then...

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