The damage caused by the flood in the Netherlands, Belgium and especially Germany in recent days has been enormous.
Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo says the flood in Belgium is the worst natural disaster the country has ever seen.
Rescue workers on Friday searched for hundreds of people who have not been accounted for after the storm in southwestern Germany and Belgium.
The total number of deaths in the floods Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands has risen to about 130 people.
Rescue crews do not appear everywhere, as many roads and bridges have been washed away.
Worst since the war
The storm is one of the worst weather disasters since World War II in Germany. The states of North Rhine-Westphalia and Rhineland-Palatinate have been hit hard after several days of extreme rainfall.
More than 1,000 people have not been accounted for in Germany, and the death toll is rising.
More rain is forecast in the coming days, and the water level is rising dangerously in the Rhine and the tributaries of the Rhine.
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The soil is saturated with water, reservoirs flood, and rivers overflow their banks. Desperate residents have sought refuge on rooftops while rescue helicopters circle their homes.
Streets and houses are under water, and overturned cars are among trees and building debris everywhere the flood has passed. In the small town of Schuld, several houses have completely collapsed.
Rescue workers are hampered by blocked roads, power outages and a lack of mobile networks, not least in the Eifel region between the Rhine and Belgium. There are several villages transformed into mounds of bricks and timber beams that could not withstand the cascading bodies of water.
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Trapped in the water masses
Twelve residents of a home for the disabled in the town of Sinzig south of Cologne in Germany have been confirmed dead.
They were trapped in the water until Thursday night and could not be evacuated.
The news agency Reuters reports that over 114,000 households in Germany are without electricity and that there is a shortage of clean water and supplies in many places.
Sweeps with cars and houses
Next to Germany, Belgium is the country in Europe that has been hardest hit by the foaming bodies of water that have accumulated after the torrential rain in recent days.
The material destruction in both countries is great. Streets were turned into rivers that swept away cars and dug away the foundations of hundreds of houses.
Trees, car wrecks, torn railway tracks and all sorts of debris and fast as the water carried me, have made small towns look around war zones.
The governor of Liege province, Herve Jamar, states that 23 dead have now been registered.
– There are still people on rooftops in the area who have not received food or drink in 36 hours, Jamar says to local TV channels, according to the news agency Belgium.
– There are several dikes along the Meuse that are under pressure. It is uncertain whether they will hold or collapse, says Interior Minister Annelies Verlinden on Friday.
The authorities in the Liege area state that the number of deaths after the flood in Belgium has been raised to 23. Many are still missing.
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– An unparalleled disaster
Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo says the flood in Belgium is the worst natural disaster the country has ever seen.
The Prime Minister declares July 20 a national day of mourning. So far, 23 deaths have been registered in the country.
– We are waiting for the final number. But this is an unparalleled disaster, says De Croo.
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