Village in Austria moves towards the German border

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Rain, rain and more rain. Central Europe has been plagued by wet weather in recent weeks. Hörbranz in Austria was hit particularly hard. The village was surprised by a landslide.

According to reports from the ORF Vorarlberg and local emergency services, the popular Pfänder hiking mountain is increasingly moving due to the moist soil. Particularly precarious: the mountainside has now slid a few meters to the west towards the German-Austrian border.

Houses were destroyed

The landslide has already caused massive damage. Several houses are uninhabitable. The sliding material has led to meters long cracks in the facades. Two of the four buildings that were evacuated on Friday are now in danger of collapsing. An affected living room shows a pronounced increase of eleven percent. Fortunately, the people in the affected houses were brought to safety in time.

Electricity and water pipes were also severely damaged by the debris. In total, the damage is estimated at five million euros.

District administrator Christian Gantner (ÖVP) assumes that “several hundred thousand cubic meters” of debris have come down from the mountain, the ORF Vorarlberg reports.

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The mayor of Hörbranz, Andreas Kresser, told the “Südkurier” that the landslide was unforeseeable. The acceleration kept increasing. There was nothing to do on site but to guard the embankment and drain it.

After all: ORF Vorarlberg writes that the slide has slowed down in recent days. Extended periods of drought have prevented further damage in recent hours. The emergency services on site now hope that the situation will ease further – and that the mountain will finally calm down. (A)

Source: Blick