During about 100 fire brigade operations in Upper Austria, two Florianis were also injured in Walding on Saturday: a falling tree hit the two emergency services. Meanwhile, some households in the state will also have to make do without electricity overnight on Sunday.
“We wanted to remove the fallen tree from a dead-end street so that the residents could drive away,” says the commander of the FF Walding, Dominik Angerer, in the interview with “Krone”. Another tree fell and hit two of Angerer’s comrades: a 55-year-old and a 23-year-old firefighter were injured.
The younger man was able to leave the hospital again on Saturday; the 55-year-old is still in hospital for treatment. “The protective equipment certainly prevented anything worse from happening,” said Commander Angerer.
A thousand missions
The operation in Walding on Saturday was one of about 1,000 across the state. Fallen trees and traffic accidents posed a constant challenge for emergency services.
“Our focus was on clearing traffic routes, accidents and trees that had fallen on power lines,” Hannes Niedermayr, officer at the state fire command, summarized the situation. “Central Upper Austria was particularly affected; our country was not hit as hard at the northern and southern points.”
Lots of “slips”
Fortunately, according to the Red Cross, most of the numerous traffic accidents have ended slightly; most of them were “slips” due to the difficult driving conditions. However, in an accident late on Saturday afternoon in Gschwandt, a 23-year-old was seriously injured: an oncoming car (driven by a 25-year-old) skidded and collided with her car, in which her sister (18) was also sitting. . All those involved in the accident are from the Gmunden district.
There were also delays in train traffic, sometimes for hours, due to the weather conditions.
Light stays off overnight
Due to the fallen trees, the lights went out in many houses and apartments on Saturday: around 40,000 customers suffered from a power outage in the morning. In the Braunau district, twelve percent of all connection points were still without power on Saturday evening.
For some of them, this will remain the case until Sunday: Because the repair work is too dangerous in the dark, “no new ones can be started for safety reasons,” says Wolfgang Denk from Netz OÖ in the evening. “The problem is that you cannot estimate at night whether more trees are in danger of falling. As soon as daylight returns, our people will be out again to carry out repairs.”
Source: Krone
I am Wallace Jones, an experienced journalist. I specialize in writing for the world section of Today Times Live. With over a decade of experience, I have developed an eye for detail when it comes to reporting on local and global stories. My passion lies in uncovering the truth through my investigative skills and creating thought-provoking content that resonates with readers worldwide.
