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CNN Live At Daybreak

Flooding in Passau Stabilizing

Aired August 14, 2002 - 06:33   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: You know, much of Germany is also under water this morning.
Our Gaven Morris is live in Passau, Germany.

Gaven, how are things looking from your vantage point?

GAVEN MORRIS, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Carol, things here are just starting to stabilize a little. It's been a very serious situation.

This is a beautiful, historic town, Passau, and the problem here has been that three rivers converged just where the most historic old part of the town is. And what's happened there is that levels have risen about 6 meters above where the river normally is, just inundated up to the ceiling, businesses, shops, homes. And for days, this city has been in crisis.

I'll step away, and you can just have a look behind me. We're a little more up-river from that scene, but here, you can see the river has come down about a meter-and-a-half from where it was. It was up at about ceiling level here.

As you can see, they are right on the river's edge normally, and these are shops, businesses, restaurants, all the sorts of things that you have along a river bank in a beautiful city. And they have been full. They have been destroyed. Inside, people are just starting to take a look at the interiors of their businesses and their homes. And I can tell you, we have been in a couple this morning, and they're devastated. The mud is just thick. It is everywhere. It is all over the place. In some businesses, the mud is a meter-and-a-half up the walls inside. And really, it's going to take a long, long time for Passau here to get back to normal.

Things are stabilizing a little, though, here. Unfortunately, the same can't be said in Dresden, which is a city in the northern state, north of here in Saxony. There, the river levels are still rising. They are expected to peak this afternoon; 30,000 are being evacuated from the Dresden City Center. Helicopters, boats being brought in to try and get those people out of the way of that river when it peaks.

Already, six people are dead in Dresden, and authorities, unfortunately, are saying with the river still yet to peak, they're expecting that toll to go much higher -- Carol.

COSTELLO: One question for you. You know, you were talking about when the waters recede and all of the damage that's going to be left behind. Are the governments of those countries equipped to deal with it?

MORRIS: Well, the German government, of course, is getting towards an election. That's due at the end of next month. So they have sprung into action very quickly. They held a Cabinet meeting yesterday, and they're going to devote about $100 million to recovery programs, particularly for a lot of these businesses that don't have any insurance. Because they are near the river, they can't get insurance for the businesses. So they have sprung into action quite quickly.

In terms of emergency supports, Austria, Bulgaria, Romania, Germany and Russia, the governments in all of those countries have been doing everything they can to muster support for the people that are still suffering under this crisis -- Carol.

COSTELLO: I can't even imagine. Gaven Morris reporting live from Germany this morning -- we thank you for that report.

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