The crisis management of the Rhineland-Palatinate state government is increasingly becoming one catastrophe after the catastrophe. For example, FOCUS online has received an explosive e-mail from the flood night of July 14 to 15, 2021 to the situation center of the Ministry of the Interior (IM).
It is the deployment report with the reference number 16037 of a crew of the police helicopter squadron Winningen: The subject line is about the clarification of the flood situation in the Ahr valley.
The IM situation center had sent the helicopters out on the evening of July 14 to shoot videos. With the help of the aerial photographs, the ministerials wanted to get a picture of the situation on site. Until then, the state government had left the relief measures to the local rescue workers.
The opinion was still that the heavy rain front would not assume extreme proportions. A fatal mistake. A good 130 people died in the flood disaster.
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The police helicopters arrived in the crisis area around 10 p.m. For an hour and 19 minutes, the observers flew the 85-kilometer river from the mouth up to the Eifel town of Schuld, took photos and filmed all too often disturbing scenes with their cameras.
In the brief email to the IM, a pilot stated: “In summary, one can say that the flooding has dramatic effects.” According to the information, at a distance of 30 kilometers between the “Local situation of Dernau and the local situation, there are numerous guilt in almost all communities along the Ahr Houses under water up to the roof.”
Many residents can only send SOS signals with flashlights because the power has gone out. Due to the strong current, it was also not possible for the local fire brigade to head for the affected houses with lifeboats. In the roof line is the conclusion: “Personal injuries and enormous property damage are to be expected.”
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The mail arrived at the IM situation center at 12:53 a.m. This evidence refutes the statement by Interior Minister Roger Lewentz (SPD) that he had no reliable situation picture of the tsunami up until the morning after the disaster.
In this respect, he was not able to set up a crisis management team and take over the nationwide operations management. The extent was not foreseeable on the night of the flood, it said. The operational report proves the opposite.
As well as telephone alerts to the IM situation center two hours before the message is delivered. But nothing prompted Lewentz to act. Rather, he went to bed at two o’clock. There was no national warning.
Meanwhile, the water masses rushed down the Ahr. Only at night did the rivers reach the middle and lower Ahr. A good 69 people died in Ahrweiler/Bad Neuenahr alone. It was not until three o’clock in the night that the floods burst their banks with enormous force at the mouth of the river in Sinzig. Twelve people drowned in the “Lebenshilfehaus” facility for the disabled.
The helicopter pilot’s mission report only appeared a good year after the start of the parliamentary committee in the Mainz state parliament on the flood disaster.
Similar to the videos of the squadron from the night of the flood, the Ministry of the Interior and the subordinate police departments had neglected to make the compromising material available to the MPs for a long time.
However, it was still emphasized on Sunday that Interior Minister Lewentz had received neither the videos nor the deployment report from his situation center on the night of the flood.
The only question is why Lewentz texted Prime Minister Dreyer the following lines at 0.53 a.m. in the situation center shortly after the police report was received? “Dear Malu, the situation is escalating.”
Six houses collapsed in guilt. “There may have been deaths. Our helicopters flew over, got flashlight signals, but couldn’t go down.”
It was not possible for the ADD to create a coherent picture of the situation, “because the defense forces are desperately deployed everywhere, but do not report to the top. In some places, communication is probably disrupted.” In the Eifel district and in the Vulkaneifel, the situation is getting worse and worse.
“We are building management structures in the police headquarters in Trier and Koblenz in order to be able to manage the situation in part.” The situation is currently very confusing. But after that nothing happened until about nine o’clock in the morning of July 15th.
After the emergence of the ominous flood videos and the police report, the opposition called a special session of the state parliament for Wednesday.
“The fact that the investigative committee did not have the police helicopter squadron’s deployment report in addition to the videos until a good two weeks ago is an outrageous scandal,” said CDU committee chairman Dirk Herber.
“The videos and the written mission report are highly relevant for the educational work. As of September, neither the reconnaissance flight nor the report was known to the committee of inquiry.”
Herber asked the state government to “explain completely why this single e-mail with the deployment report was not included in the files of the situation center up to September 19. At the same time, the question arises for us as to whether further files have been withheld from the investigative committee to date”.
