Latvian town on high alert as icy water threatens to breach dam
Residents of a Latvian town were on high alert on Saturday as a mass of ice slowly moving along a local river threatened to flood a dam built to protect their homes.
Officials have been warning of the creeping threat for several days in Jekabpils, a town about 120km southeast of the capital Riga on the Daugava river with around 21,000 residents.
The river usually freezes over in winter until spring, but instead has produced an icy mass which is pushing water levels up as well as putting pressure on the dam.
The situation is stable but still dangerous, local officials said on Sunday (January 15). On Saturday, residents watched the ice slowly move downstream from a walkway on top of the dam.
"I won’t deny it is very worrying", said businessman Martins Lauva, who had returned to the town to encourage his family to move to a safer location.
He pointed to climate change as the cause of the phenomenon, which weather experts have also said was caused by swings in temperature. "Here we are – in January, endangered by floods. This is the most definitely an anomaly of nature."
Latvia was among several European countries seeing record-high January temperatures at the start of the month. January 1 saw a high of 11.7 degrees Celsius (53 degrees Fahrenheit) according to the LSM news portal run by Latvia's public broadcaster.
Some outlying areas upstream of the town have already flooded, as they are not protected by the dam.
Residents have been advised to evacuate if they can, and a shelter has been opened in a local school for those who choose to do so.
Emergency services and Latvia's Home Guard have been called in to help pump water away from flooded areas and shore up the dam with sandbags.
Jekabpils mayor Raivis Ragainis said he feared what would happen if the dam broke and the ice flowed into the town, saying it would be a wave that "goes like a bulldozer and wipes away everything".
"It is not about whether we hide on the second floor or we live on the ground floor, or we managed to escape, it would just push away the houses", Ragainis said.
Water levels had dropped on Sunday but remain critically high, at 30 centimetres (12 inches) above the level considered dangerous, LSM reported. Latvia's government held a crisis meeting on Sunday morning to discuss the situation.
Reuters
