Hello. Welcome at the Environment Agency.
Hello to everyone following us online as well.
Our alerts about extreme weather conditions and floods
are helpful when we adapt to the changing climate.
If you follow the alerts and protect yourselves,
your property and life will be safer.
Branko Gregorčič and Janez Polajnar will present the alert.
For other areas, the director of the Water Agency Neža Kodre,
the Civil Protection commander Srečko Šestan and the director
of the Geological Survey Miloš Bavec will tell you more.
Brane, go ahead.
Thank you. Welcome, everyone.
This autumn, there are a lot of cyclones
above the northern Atlantic.
Today, we are seeing one of the deepest in the past decades.
It has reached the South of Great Britain
in is affecting the weather in France.
The cold front is fast approaching the Alps
and will pass Slovenia during the night.
Before the front, we expect humid and warm air
from the South or the Southwest
which will bring heavy rain in the evening,
especially in the western mountains.
At sea, we expect heavy southern winds
with gusts up to 70-100 km/h.
It will blow in the evening and the first half of the night
and it will bring humid sea air
to the Julian Alps.
There, we expect heavy rain already before the front,
more than 100 mm in six hours.
When the front will pass Slovenia,
we expect heavy rain and wind throughout the country.
The most rain will fall in the Soča region,
Bohinj and Upper Sava Valley. In the mountains, the winds will be strong
and there will be heavy rain in places
north of the first barrier as well.
Heavy rain will also come to the Austrian Carinthia
and in Friuli Venezia Giulia,
heavy rain can be expected.
In 24 hours, 120-240 mm of rain will fall
in the northwestern Slovenia,
which is why we issued the red alert.
Elsewhere, there will be less rain, 60-120 mm in the mountainous regions
and elsewhere, even less. We will have the most turbulent weather
during night, from tonight to tomorrow morning.
Then, the situation will get better. There will still be rain
and it will also get colder. The snow can fall
1000-1300 m high,
but it will not cause any trouble.
The night will be the most critical.
On Sunday or during the night between Saturday and Sunday,
another front will come. Today, it seems
it will be less powerful,
but this can change, of course. We will know more tomorrow.
Thank you, Brane. Janez, present the hydrological situation.
Hello. During the night and tomorrow,
we will have autumn floods. We are in the middle of autumn
and the vegetation does not protect the soil anymore
as much as in August when it was protected to an extent.
The water will flow away fast.
The rivers in the Northwest and elsewhere
will rise fast. They will reach high flow volumes
and flood in some places.
During the night, we expect mostly torrent water.
The torrents in the Soča region,
Idrija and Cerkno Hills,
river basins of Idrijca and Bača, in the river Sora area,
especially Selška Sora, and in the Upper Sava Valley
will rise really fast. These torrents
will fill the rivers tomorrow.
Sava, which absorbs a lot of the rain water,
will rise tomorrow as well
and already tonight. In Ljubljana,
it can reach a flow rate of about 1500 or even 1600 cubic meters per second.
This is a fairly large flow rate, although we've recorded such a rate
on Christmas floods in the year 2009
and in year 2010 on autumn flooding.
But outflow conditions have changed a little
and tomorrow morning we should be additionally careful
on the wider middle area of river Sava as well.
We expect
these torrential floods to be most acute on the aforesaid areas.
But they are possible elsewhere too.
For example in Vipava valley, by the river Kolpa,
and on the coast there could come to torrential overflows
and stagnation of storm water. Especially now,
when leaves are falling and causing additional troubles
at water drainage in urban areas.
The second unfortunate situation
shall be on river Drava.
Probably it shall have a bigger flow rate
of 1600 cubic meters per second tomorrow morning.
On the inlet in the country.
During the day river Drava will be joined from other inflows.
We expect the flooding of Drava through the whole day.
Especially in the downstream, could be in a wider scope.
We expect the flow rate of 1800 cubic meters per second, maybe more.
Tomorrow afternoon and on Friday night.
At least this afternoon there is time
to use it for self-protection
and self-protection measures. We should take valuable items
on the higher grounds. We should move especially cars on safety.
We should also clean drains by the houses
and remove the fallen leaves.
I warn you that the water shall rise very quickly.
Then we save our lives and not belongings.
In the meantime we should observe all civil protection's instructions.
Thank you.
Thank you, Janez.
For circumstances that Water Agency is monitoring.
Hello from me too.
As far as measures on watercourses are concerned,
we are still implementing emergency measures in the whole of Slovenia.
There are 212 teams in the field
that are taking care for the flow of watercourses.
They are repairing damage on the dams and similar things.
Considering the weather forecast
they should remove the machinery
in the afternoon on the watercourses in the endangered areas.
They shall start implementing emergency measures
to prevent the damage
or to avert the risks,
connected to the floods.
It shall start with on-call duties, monitoring the water levels.
When necessary the teams should intervene.
They shall remove the material that would block the river flow.
They shall make temporary dams and bursts.
All teams are ready
and they will work during the night and in the following days.
As far as warnings are concerned
I would like to add a warning. We ask all citizens,
to remove from coastal areas all the materials
that water could take downstream.
Bales of hay, firewood or something similar
that could block areas under bridges.
In that way we can avoid
an even bigger damage.
Thank you.
Thank you. Neža Kodre, a director of Water Agency.
I invite a civil protection commander Srečko Šestan.
Hello, everybody.
My predecessors have issued quite a few warnings.
I have to say that the warnings that we issue, including me,
are not meant as a joke.
In that way we are trying to save a life or reduce damage.
We get ridiculed on social networks,
but I don't mind that,
if we save one life and reduce the damage.
Mr Polajnar mentioned, issued a warning through the media,
I heard him on the radio when I was driving to Ljubljana,
to clean the drains.
Ljubljana is full of leaves, not only Ljubljana,
all urban and non-urban areas.
These shafts are the ones that cause additional flooding.
I'm repeating the warning now.
An order has already been prepared, which I will now go sign,
for everyone to be on alert,
except in Pomurje and Murska Sobota.
All other areas will be on alert,
the information centres, the regional centres and warehouses,
and, of course, all those workers and commanders
who need to conduct activities in these areas.
As usually, also a certain number of Slovenian soldiers
with the machinery,
we already have some of this machinery in Baška grapa
for this purpose
and for the overnight accommodation of the fire brigades
who have been stationed there for two days
from the entire North Primorska region.
The Nova Gorica Red Cross is erecting an accommodation unit
which will, if necessary, serve for the accommodation of evacuated people,
if they have no other option.
As Mr Polajnar said, we're trying to do as much as we can
before the event. If it bypasses us, thank God, I'll be very happy.
But if it doesn't, at least we will know that we did something
despite, as I said before, various comments
appearing on social media. Thank you very much.
The Geological Survey of Slovenia Director Miloš Bavec,
please provide a description of the geological circumstances.
Hello. The conditions are really exceptional,
in addition to exceptional precipitation that we expect tonight,
especially in the area of the Julian Alps and their foothills,
the ground is extremely wet all over Slovenia.
Despite the fact that we are somewhat used to
landslides and similar phenomena,
today the situation is even more aggravated.
In addition to the areas where the precipitation will be the worst,
the strongest, we're also warning the areas
that have been affected already,
with an emphasis on the Kamnik-Savinja Alps, Karavanke
and their wider outskirts,
because individual landslides can easily reactivate.
We remind you to clean the drains
that are already established for the drainage of individual landslides.
Especially in cases where the dimensions allow for this,
it is worth to cover the landslides and their broken edges with foils.
Some of the gutters that will fill up
drain into the landslides, which is extremely problematic.
Do whatever you can to drain the water,
even the smallest drains from the existing landslides.
Thank you. According to the information we have so far,
we expect to have another press conference tomorrow at the same time.
You will get an invitation in the morning.
Now we have time for additional clarifications, if they are needed.
I have a question. -Go ahead. -For the Slovenian Water Agency.
My coworker is in Sneberje where they're preparing for the worst.
The residents are worried,
because nothing has been done about the rampart.
Did you get the appeal with more than 120 signatures?
Given the high flow of Sava, will you do something?
A question about Sneberje. Go ahead.
Yes, as far as Sneberje is concerned,
we are in constant contact with our colleagues
from the Environment Agency.
What you see here is also happening in the background.
Our colleagues checked the flow, as Mr Polajnar mentioned.
In the Sneberje area, we are expecting a flow
no higher than it has been at least five times from the year 2000.
We're speaking about a much lower flow,
around 1400 m3.
The start of August saw flow rates of more than 2000 cubic meters.
This means that the events are lower by a third compared to
the statistics.
Which means that under this forecast, the water here would spill
out of urbanised areas, i.e.
over the bank.
But it doesn't floods the area. Nevertheless, both people from the Water
Directorate of the Republic of Slovenia and colleagues from the
mandatory public utility have been activated at the moment.
They are on the ground and they are trying to implement some temporary
measures to prevent, to rehabilitate the area, at least temporarily.
But I have to say what I said at the previous press conference: there is
no water infrastructure in this area of Sneberje, no dikes, that is to
say, to prevent water from pouring into these areas.
This area still needs to be protected and it needs to be
protected in a comprehensive way, so we are also in contact with the
Municipality of Ljubljana.
How to prepare projects that will, in the long term, comprehensively,
adequately, I will say, protect the area.
Can we make a comparison, in fact, how serious these warnings you
are giving today are? You said that the waters will rise very quickly.
We saw in August what was actually happening when the waters were rising
very rapidly, so we are interested to see how we can really put this
into some kind of context, how serious these warnings are, and then
perhaps Mr Šestan, have you called on local communities to take any
specific preventive measures, if you can say anything more about that?
And you mentioned the army.
If you could tell us how many members of the armed forces might be
on standby?
Three questions.
Comparing these warnings with the ones in August.
A question for civil protection, how prepared municipalities are and how
many troops are on the ground.
If we try to compare today's weather situation with the one in August, then
we have to bear in mind that
the surface temperature of the Mediterranean Sea was then between 28
and 29 degrees, now it's just over 20 degrees, so that's optimistic.
On the other hand, air currents over Slovenia today will be stronger than
they were in August.
The direction of the high winds will also be slightly different, so it is
very difficult to compare the two events in a lump sum in advance.
We have assessed that today's expected, intense, mainly evening and
overnight rainfall is so threatening that we have issued the highest level
of warning, mainly for the north-west.
There is, of course, some uncertainty about how much, how wide
the area will still be covered by rainfall and where it will cause
problems. The situation on the ground has also changed again, so it
is virtually impossible to make comparisons in advance.
We may then be able to analyse both events retrospectively.
But we would not underestimate today's event in any way.
We may have forgotten to mention it before, because the tides of the
Slovenian sea are also a stream of this information.
It will be a night of high.
We have had a few high tides in the last week, but this night too.
Although the astronomical tide is not very high, the strong southerly
wind will make water surfaces, i.e.
water masses in the northern part of the Adriatic, very high, and areas of
neighbouring Italy as well as the Slovenian coast will be flooded,
presumably up to about 40 centimetres.
Above the coastline, the sea will be quite choppy, so there may be some
problems with that on our coastline as well.
Yes, absolutely. The answer is yes.
Municipalities are also aware of this Regulation and receive it
through our Notification Centre system.
All protection, rescue and relief forces also receive this order,
so we do not give specific instructions with the order, because
we are already well used to this and the municipalities know well their
specific area.
What are the steps they can take beforehand and what do they need to
prepare for. The Slovenian Armed Forces have been putting one
reinforced company on standby for the last few orders.
It's a military term.
It means 300 to 400 troops, but they can be reinforced by much more,
of course with the machinery they have at their disposal.
It is important to know that they still have some of the machinery that
they have, they still have it on the ground from the third of August, they
are still there helping.
Now we also have two excavators and two trucks of soldiers in Baška Grapa
at the moment, so the ones I mentioned are going to stay there
overnight and will wait until something needs to be done, and if we
need manpower it will be provided.
But I hope not.
Thank you very much. If there are no more questions I just want to remind you
that tomorrow we will invite you to join us at the same time and place
so again thank you very much and good luck.