Rhine cargo shipping continues, but with vessels sometimes forced to sail three-quarters empty with cargo owners often needing to pay for four vessels to transport their loads instead of one. Container logistics service company Contargo said on Friday it would largely discontinue its barge operations on the Middle and upper Rhine river, transporting what goods it could overground to its terminals on the Lower Rhine, warning however that its trucking capacities were limited. Started August 27, 2021, By "I think it's more dangerous this time because the supply situation is tight anyway and the coal-fired power plants in particular, which are extremely important for generating electricity, are likely to be hit harder.. This coupled with capacity issues on German railways has meant that Switzerland is struggling with supplies of oil products, mainly diesel/heating oil, according to Avenergy Suisse, the landlocked countrys organization for fuel importers. Thanks for the updates! We are having far too high water temperatures, which is having a toxic effect on the Rhines inhabitants, on fishes, on the entire ecosystem, the climatologist Karsten Brandt told Der Spiegel. Not sure where it's from @notamermaid, it came up on one of my news sites. [1/5]The passenger ferry Rheinnixe stops its operation due to low water in the Rhine in Bonn, Germany, August 16, 2022. Expected rain in the coming days is forecast to increase levels in the Rhine by 50-to-80 centimetres in the coming days, a spokesperson for the Federal Waterways and Shipping Administration said, adding they would have to climb by 1-1.5 metres to reach levels typical for this time of the year. Oh, about Emmerich. Low water levels on the Rhine River mean that barges hauling middle distillate-type oil products - typically gasoil/diesel - past Kaub in Germany, are limited to loading about 30% of capacity, according to maritime brokerage services firm Riverlake. . Not a major deal - sadly - as we get them on a regular basis during construction work. The ships I have been on were busy but pleasant. That is fascinating about the sister ships. Also damage to cars due to trees, a bit of debris, etc. Just replied to the Danube thread. We also received a $25 pp credit for lunch for the day we were off the ship in Speyer. LowRhinewater level combined with capacity problems on German railways are the reasons, managing director Roland Bilang told Bloomberg, adding that supply problems mainly concern diesel/heating oil. Economists blamed the Rhine shipping stoppage for a significant . Hope it is not too much in one place. Build the strongest argument relying on authoritative content, attorney-editor expertise, and industry defining technology. https://www.dwd.de/DE/wetter/warnungen_gemeinden/warnWetter_node.html, https://www.contargo.net/en/goodtoknow/lws/, https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/what-may-be-the-last-gladiator-arena-ever-built-discovered-in-switzerland-180979497/, https://www.visit.alsace/en/261000884-rhinau-island-a-small-jungle-in-the-rhine-forest/, http://fhren-rhein.de/faehren/faehre-rhenanus-kappel-grafenhausen-rheinau/, https://www.basel.com/en/attractions/ferries-1c2b0d1624, https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Roos_(Schiff), https://www.bingen-ruedesheimer.de/schiffsmiete/flotte/schiff/af-mary-roos, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bg0D3JHRYPY, Click here to reload the page in order to enable certain features, Policy regarding COVID related Discussions. You should find some news in English when you google Emmerich Rhine. Rather than driving on the Eastern side of the river all the way through Germany, we chose to go through France and cross the river. The company has done that and much cargo is going by rail and road instead. The water level in the river Rhine as it enters the Netherlands at Lobith is approaching a record low, causing problems for shipping and the irrigation of crops, waterways authority Rijkswaterstaat has confirmed.. Meanwhile, I read that the large barge - a "Verband" as we call it - that had got stuck during the night near Oberwesel is free and had has moved further up to Bingen. Two other gauges that trigger this are at Duisburg and Emmerich. According to Colognes city drainage operations, ships wanting to navigate the river have a total height allowance of 111 centimetres plus the water level of 103cm in other words, just 2.14 metres beneath their keel. "Because of the lower water levels, only around 600 tons was possible of late. Economists estimate the disruption could knock as much as half a percentage point off Germany's overall economic growth this year. Large German companies such as BASF and ThyssenKrupp rely on the Rhine for their supply of fuel, and vessels on the river also carry coal to power stations that the government has chosen to use more intensively in response to Russia throttling its pipeline delivery of natural gas. The much reduced load can result in a financial loss and therefore, to prevent that, one logistics company stopped operating on that section of the Rhine. In 2018, Germany entered a brief recession, sparked in part by low water levels on the Rhine. Flowing from the Swiss Alps to the North Sea via German industrial heartlands, the Rhine is a major route for products ranging from grains, to chemicals to coal. August 2, 2022 1:48 PM EDT. By Yes, folks, I have already got some day trip travel reports waiting to be posted. Reuters provides business, financial, national and international news to professionals via desktop terminals, the world's media organizations, industry events and directly to consumers. I'm glad you reminded me about the cooler nights. Siebengebirge is the name of the mountain range upstream from Bonn. Barges on the Rhine which carry . That sounds rather uncomfortable. Credit rating agency Moody's said the low Rhine water levels will increase costs for chemicals companies, particularly those with production facilities on the upper Rhine, and could lead to production cuts. across much of Europe and the Northern Hemisphere at present. For wind you may find a scarf useful. The bends of the shallow river are a problem. The resulting bottlenecks are another drag on Europe's largest economy, which is grappling with high inflation, supply chain disruptions and soaring gas prices after Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February. As we all know, we are safer outside than inside as regards infections. Still cannot get over that stupid headline. Capital Economics' chief economist Andrew Kenningham said Germany is particularly reliant on its rivers to transport freight, especially for industrial raw materials such as coal, crude oil, coke and basic chemicals. Frankfurt to Nuremberg is still on, if you can find such an itinerary. Browse an unrivalled portfolio of real-time and historical market data and insights from worldwide sources and experts. Businesses along the river say drought means they are on the verge of having to shut production. I have mentioned ship accidents. They say the rain and thunderstorms are only a short thing and the overall weather will not change. BERLIN/LOBITH, Netherlands, Aug 10 (Reuters) - Already bracing for recession and winter energy shortages, German businesses are grappling with the lack of another precious commodity: rain. "Ships are still running, but fewer of them and with lighter loads," the spokesman of the German Waterways and Shipping Office (WSA), Florian Krekel, told Reuters news agency. Weeks of drought across Europe and beyond have added to supply chain problems as vessels have had to lighten their loads to ensure they can travel along depleted water channels. I agree, "the death of river cruising" was clickbait, and it will take more than 1 year of low water to do so. The hood on the raincoat should do the trick with the cold temperatures. Carnival is slowly approaching but most likely will not take place in its usual formats and intensity. In an emailed statement, BASF said it had implemented an early warning system for low water levels and is also chartering and developing ships suitable for shallower waters. its so sad to see the Rhine so low. Sounds as if they were getting it to more or less maximum capacity. The Copernicus Sentinel-2 mission captured part of the Rhine River near Cologneshowing the stark difference between August 2021 and August 2022. It happened in Autumn last year to a river cruise ship at Koblenz. Kaub gauge is at 36cm. . "At the beginning of March, the ships could be loaded with roughly 2,200 [metric] tons," Lorenz said. And sturdy shoes that faithfully take you over cobblestones and do not mind splashes of water. "It might not be a mistake to assume at this point that the low water will weigh on GDP by a quarter to half a percentage point," said Jens-Oliver Niklasch, an economist at LBBW. Started June 21, 2021, By Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles. That is where there is one way traffic regulated with traffic lights. HAMBURG, Aug 12 (Reuters) - Water levels on the river Rhine in Germany have fallen again in dry weather on Friday, with some vessels no longer able to sail, shipping operators and brokers said. If this should be the case, does this mean we get off at Speyer for excursion and get on another boat in Koblenz or is ship change actually just at the Gorge? There is no specific level at which shipping stops, said Roberto Spranzi, director of the DTG shipping cooperative which operates about 100 cargo vessels on the Rhine. Sorry to read that you cannot experience the S.S.Antoinette. There is a ferry called the "Mary Roos". After a hot and dry summer, this week's weather forecast for Germany appeared to offer some relief. The low water levels are adding to Europe's energy crisis, sparked by the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Water levels are expected to keep dropping in the Rhine, a key shipping route for Germany, Drought disrupts river traffic on Germany's Rhine, Olaf Scholz at Davos: 2022 'challenged us as never before', World in 'sorry state' UN chief Guterres, Davos: Social entrepreneurs eye real change, Egyptian activists: We need to talk about abortion, Japan nuclear plant execs acquitted over Fukushima disaster, 'When you see antisemitism, act immediately'. Archie Bland and Nimo Omer take you through the top stories and what they mean, free every weekday morning. The water level at Kaub near Frankfurt a key waypoint where the fairway is shallower than elsewhere on the river fell below 40cm on Friday afternoon, the level at which it is no longer economical for many barges to transit the river. 2013 had been a dragged-out winter. That sounds a good idea.