{"id":44498,"date":"2021-07-20T16:12:10","date_gmt":"2021-07-20T15:12:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/?p=44498"},"modified":"2021-07-21T10:44:19","modified_gmt":"2021-07-21T09:44:19","slug":"fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/","title":{"rendered":"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany&#8217;s disaster preparedness"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><b>Almost 200 people were killed and more than 700 were injured in catastrophic floods in Germany over the past week.\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Heavy rainfall triggered severe flooding, landslides and sinkholes across western Germany, destroying houses and sweeping away cars. <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">&#8220;The German language hardly knows any words for the devastation that has been caused here,\u201d <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">chancellor Angela Merkel said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">The government is facing mounting criticism<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> that it was unprepared for the fatal floods. While the intense rainfall was forecast, many residents of affected areas did not get the message about how dangerous the impacts could be.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Michael Theurer, a member of the opposition centre-right Free Democrats Party, told German media that the death toll highlighted a \u201csystemic failure\u201d in the emergency response.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Ministers have played down the federal government&#8217;s responsibility for the disaster.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cIt would be completely inconceivable for such a catastrophe to be managed centrally from any one place &#8211; you need local knowledge,\u201d interior minister Horst Seehoffer said, rejecting the criticism.<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_44485\" style=\"width: 807px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-44485\" class=\"size-full wp-image-44485\" src=\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/E6ZslLBXsAMn_Sk.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"797\" height=\"451\" srcset=\"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/16145943\/E6ZslLBXsAMn_Sk.jpg 797w, https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/16145943\/E6ZslLBXsAMn_Sk-112x63.jpg 112w, https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/16145943\/E6ZslLBXsAMn_Sk-297x168.jpg 297w, https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/16145943\/E6ZslLBXsAMn_Sk-768x435.jpg 768w, https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/16145943\/E6ZslLBXsAMn_Sk-596x337.jpg 596w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 797px) 100vw, 797px\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-44485\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">The river Rhine burst its banks in Bonn, home to UN Climate Change headquarters (Photo: <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AkoSiAys\/status\/1415938548604317701\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Ays Espiritu<\/a>)<\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Climate scientists told Climate Home News that there was clearly a disconnect between the weather forecasts and the warnings communicated to residents in Germany.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201c<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">More than 100 fatalities in a flood is a fair sign of a failure. Authorities should have put in action plans to evacuate people who were in the path of the water, and individuals needed to know what to do to protect themselves,\u201d said <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Hannah Cloke, professor of hydrology at the University of Reading, who set up and advises the <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">European Flood Awareness System.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">In many areas authorities acted in time, evacuating people, erecting temporary flood defences, and moving vehicles to higher ground, Cloke told Climate Home News.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cBut if people did not hear the warnings, or failed to see the danger they or their communities were in, then the warning system has failed. It is like a smoke alarm in a fire that fails to go off because it has no batteries.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n<blockquote><p><a href=\"https:\/\/climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/16\/chileans-look-new-constitution-return-water-communities\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><strong>Chileans look to<\/strong>\u00a0new constitution to return water to communities<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThere was some kind of breakdown in communication,\u201d Hayley Fowler, professor of climate change impacts at Newcastle University, told Climate Home News.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cIt\u2019s shocking that so many people lost their lives in a developed western economy like Germany in this event which was well forecast. I hope that a much better system is put in place for warnings in the future,\u201d she said, adding that in many countries it is unclear where the responsibility lies for dealing with severe flooding and other extreme weather events.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Roads, houses and bridges were unable to withstand the severe floods in <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia, two of the worst hit states.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cOur infrastructure appears unable to change as fast as the climate is changing. This is the crux of the problem. We need to create agility and flexibility in how we design, manage, finance, and govern infrastructure,\u201d Mikhail Chester, environmental engineering professor at Arizona State University, told Climate Home News.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Examples of effective infrastructure built to withstand flooding include Kuala Lumpur\u2019s Smart Tunnel, which doubles as a traffic and stormwater tunnel, and The Netherlands\u2019 Room for the River programme which restores natural floodplains, he said.<\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_44497\" style=\"width: 810px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-44497\" class=\"size-full wp-image-44497\" src=\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/Flooding-Germany-3-e1626785448526.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"533\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-44497\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Severe flooding in Meckenheim, near Bonn in Germany, on 14 July 2021 (Photo: <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/larslowinski\/status\/1415588283472564224\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Lars Lowinski\/Twitter<\/a>)<\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">It is critical that governments incorporate climate risks, including increased rainfall and rising river levels, into planning regulations and infrastructure design, Fowler said. According to a <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/royalsocietypublishing.org\/doi\/10.1098\/rsta.2019.0548\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">recent review<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, efforts to do this remain in their infancy around the world.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">One country that has adopted this mindset is the Netherlands, according to Fowler. The country&#8217;s southern provinces experienced extreme rainfall, but towns were not completely submerged and there were no fatalities.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">\u201cThey have really thought about both climate change and preparing for flooding events. They have managed their systems so that they anticipate changes a decade ahead and ensure that they reduce the risk to the population from flooding,\u201d Fowler said.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">To increase their resilience to floods, countries could look to construct additional reservoirs and lakes upstream or natural flood management features, such as leaky dams, which slow down the flow of water. It is not as simple as raising the river banks, Fowler said. \u201cIf they do overtop, the flooding becomes more severe. You can only protect up to a point.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"While heavy rain was forecast, infrastructure was overwhelmed and many residents did not get the message about the dangers","protected":false},"author":57,"featured_media":44496,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[82,448],"tags":[27,270],"coauthors":[4555],"class_list":["post-44498","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-eu","category-water","tag-flooding","tag-germany","type-news"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany&#039;s disaster preparedness<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"While heavy rain was forecast, infrastructure was overwhelmed and many residents did not get the message about the dangers\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany&#039;s disaster preparedness\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"While heavy rain was forecast, infrastructure was overwhelmed and many residents did not get the message about the dangers\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Climate Home News\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/ClimateHomeNews\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2021-07-20T15:12:10+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2021-07-21T09:44:19+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"800\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"450\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Isabelle Gerretsen\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@ClimateHome\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@ClimateHome\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Isabelle Gerretsen\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Isabelle Gerretsen\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#\/schema\/person\/7d28f86877bd55b87dc8377eab414bb0\"},\"headline\":\"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany&#8217;s disaster preparedness\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-07-20T15:12:10+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-07-21T09:44:19+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/\"},\"wordCount\":744,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"Flooding\",\"Germany\"],\"articleSection\":[\"EU\",\"Water\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/\",\"name\":\"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany's disaster preparedness\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2021-07-20T15:12:10+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2021-07-21T09:44:19+00:00\",\"description\":\"While heavy rain was forecast, infrastructure was overwhelmed and many residents did not get the message about the dangers\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg\",\"width\":800,\"height\":450,\"caption\":\"Severe flooding in Meckenheim, near Bonn in Germany, on 14 July 2021 (Photo: Lars Lowinski\/Twitter)\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany&#8217;s disaster preparedness\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/\",\"name\":\"Climate Home News\",\"description\":\"Climate change news, analysis, commentary, video and podcasts focused on developments in global climate politics\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":\"required name=search_term_string\"}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#organization\",\"name\":\"Climate Home News\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2024\/01\/03155729\/Climate-Home-News-Logo-RGB-Colour.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2024\/01\/03155729\/Climate-Home-News-Logo-RGB-Colour.png\",\"width\":2856,\"height\":862,\"caption\":\"Climate Home News\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/ClimateHomeNews\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/ClimateHome\",\"https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/climate-home-news\",\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/user\/climatestudio\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#\/schema\/person\/7d28f86877bd55b87dc8377eab414bb0\",\"name\":\"Isabelle Gerretsen\",\"description\":\"Isabelle Gerretsen is a reporter for Climate Home News. She previously covered climate for CNN International and has written for national and international publications including The Independent, the BBC, Reuters and Newsweek.\",\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/\"],\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/author\/isabelle-gerretsen\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany's disaster preparedness","description":"While heavy rain was forecast, infrastructure was overwhelmed and many residents did not get the message about the dangers","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/","og_locale":"en_GB","og_type":"article","og_title":"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany's disaster preparedness","og_description":"While heavy rain was forecast, infrastructure was overwhelmed and many residents did not get the message about the dangers","og_url":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/","og_site_name":"Climate Home News","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/ClimateHomeNews\/","article_published_time":"2021-07-20T15:12:10+00:00","article_modified_time":"2021-07-21T09:44:19+00:00","og_image":[{"width":800,"height":450,"url":"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Isabelle Gerretsen","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@ClimateHome","twitter_site":"@ClimateHome","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Isabelle Gerretsen","Estimated reading time":"4 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/"},"author":{"name":"Isabelle Gerretsen","@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#\/schema\/person\/7d28f86877bd55b87dc8377eab414bb0"},"headline":"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany&#8217;s disaster preparedness","datePublished":"2021-07-20T15:12:10+00:00","dateModified":"2021-07-21T09:44:19+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/"},"wordCount":744,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg","keywords":["Flooding","Germany"],"articleSection":["EU","Water"],"inLanguage":"en-GB"},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/","url":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/","name":"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany's disaster preparedness","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg","datePublished":"2021-07-20T15:12:10+00:00","dateModified":"2021-07-21T09:44:19+00:00","description":"While heavy rain was forecast, infrastructure was overwhelmed and many residents did not get the message about the dangers","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-GB","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-GB","@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2021\/07\/20135015\/Flooding-Germany-2-e1626792550861.jpg","width":800,"height":450,"caption":"Severe flooding in Meckenheim, near Bonn in Germany, on 14 July 2021 (Photo: Lars Lowinski\/Twitter)"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/2021\/07\/20\/fatal-floods-german-authorities-face-criticism-lack-preparation\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Fatal floods expose gaps in Germany&#8217;s disaster preparedness"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/","name":"Climate Home News","description":"Climate change news, analysis, commentary, video and podcasts focused on developments in global climate politics","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}],"inLanguage":"en-GB"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#organization","name":"Climate Home News","url":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-GB","@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2024\/01\/03155729\/Climate-Home-News-Logo-RGB-Colour.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/cdn.climatechangenews.com\/files\/2024\/01\/03155729\/Climate-Home-News-Logo-RGB-Colour.png","width":2856,"height":862,"caption":"Climate Home News"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/ClimateHomeNews\/","https:\/\/x.com\/ClimateHome","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/climate-home-news","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/user\/climatestudio"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/#\/schema\/person\/7d28f86877bd55b87dc8377eab414bb0","name":"Isabelle Gerretsen","description":"Isabelle Gerretsen is a reporter for Climate Home News. She previously covered climate for CNN International and has written for national and international publications including The Independent, the BBC, Reuters and Newsweek.","sameAs":["https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/"],"url":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/author\/isabelle-gerretsen\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44498"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/57"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44498"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44498\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":44499,"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44498\/revisions\/44499"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44498"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44498"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44498"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.climatechangenews.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=44498"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}