Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen: The man who warned of the flood

• OfVolker Ufertinger

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Kai Zorn saw it coming. Unlike most meteorologists, the Tölzer had urgently warned people hours before the great flood in western Germany to get to safety.

Bad Tölz-Wolfratshausen – The 47-year-old said literally on his YouTube channel: “There will be no conventional flood. The flash flood will come in minutes, so you have no chance. It is life-threatening locally. Save yourself who can. ”He was right – unfortunately.

70,000 subscribers on YouTube

Anger doesn’t want to make a big deal out of it. He turned down a friend’s advice to send the program to the Bild newspaper and make it big. He just wants to deal with the weather and share his knowledge with his 70,000 subscribers. “I’m so happy with it,” he says. He has been on the air on his YouTube channel since June last year, sometimes twice a day. He set up a camera on the first floor of his house and covered the room with winter coats so that it didn’t echo.

The flash flood will come in minutes, so you have no chance.

The question arises as to how Zorn managed to precisely predict the catastrophe. The magic word is: synoptics. Unlike most meteorologists, the Ellbacher does not simply read a model. He compares the different models and applies them to local conditions. As a child he read specialist books on meteorology until he was trained in a private weather company that supplied Antenne Bayern. “My mentor Christian König practically drilled me,” he says. He had to learn to predict the temperature to within half a degree and the snow line to within ten meters. “I’m incredibly grateful for that today.”

For him, his success has two reasons. On the one hand, he takes his time, some of his clips last ten minutes. “When I started to explain in more detail, I noticed how the traffic was going up,” he says. Apparently, people really want to be properly informed. And: He dispenses with the constant alarmism of the public broadcasters regarding climate change. On the contrary. Zorn insists that extremes have always been part of the weather.

Extreme weather conditions even in the Middle Ages

He does not want to comment on whether there is climate change. It’s an extremely sensitive issue in the industry and in society as a whole. “I’m not a climatologist,” is all he says. However, he points out that in the past there have been far more extreme weather conditions than at present over a longer period of time. Around 1342 the notorious Magdalen floods, the worst flooding of the second millennium in Central Europe, when the great rivers overflowed their banks and tore away all bridges. Or the extreme drought and hot summer of 1540, when it was seven degrees hotter on average and the forests were blazing throughout Europe. For comparison: the summer of 2003 was 3.4 degrees warmer.

Also read: Thunderstorm super cell hits Königsdorf

One can see: Zorn’s approach is more of a historical kind. “The chronicles of the past 1000 years show the framework conditions between drought and flood, between cold and heat.” . What worries him is the destroyed nature, i.e. the sealed surfaces and the cleaned up hallway. “Floods like that two weeks ago in western Germany mercilessly reveal human errors.”

Advice: Live more in harmony with nature

For the Ellbacher, the solution for the future is: As a matter of principle, people should live more in harmony with nature again. As far as his industry is concerned, he would like it to orient itself more closely to the well-documented key data of extreme events. This requires a community of experts – above all home nurses and local chroniclers. With a grin, he adds: “I don’t think we’ll ever see the Calvary in Tölz becoming a wine-growing area again, as it was around 800 years ago.”

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