Danube Hits Record Low, Water Curbs Loom in Serbia
The Danube fell to minus 127 centimeters, its lowest reading in half a century. Sombor, Kula and Vrbas are under a state of emergency, and forecasters see no rain for 15 to 20 days.
Will there be less water coming out of the tap in August? In part of Vojvodina that is no longer a distant scenario. On July 29 the Danube dropped to minus 127 centimeters, an all-time low, and the Provincial Government declared a state of emergency the same day in the city of Sombor and the municipalities of Kula and Vrbas.
The decision came at an emergency session of the Provincial Emergency Headquarters, chaired by Maja Gojkovic, president of the Provincial Government and head of the body. 270 million dinars, roughly 2.3 million euros, was set aside for urgent work keeping the Danube-Tisa-Danube hydro system running. The money goes to the public water utility Vode Vojvodine.
What minus 127 centimeters actually means
A negative reading does not mean the riverbed is empty. It means the water sits below the gauge zero, the reference point at the measuring station. The Republic Hydrometeorological Institute, known in Serbia as RHMZ, says several stations recorded their lowest levels in 50 years, with the stretch from Bezdan to Slankamen in the worst shape.
The damage is already measurable:
- pumps at Bezdan and Bogojevo are running, but below capacity
- Danube water near Novi Sad has been downgraded to class four, with poor ecological status, because of shifting dissolved oxygen levels and high water temperature
- river traffic has fallen to about a third of normal
Branko Savic of Yuagent in Bezdan put a number on it: “Ships on the Danube are sailing at only 25 to 30 percent of capacity.”
When could water restrictions start?
August, if the rain stays away. Dejan Vladikovic of the Republic Hydrometeorological Institute says: “No significant rainfall is expected in the next 15 to 20 days.” RHMZ warns that smaller rivers in Serbia could approach their biological minimum, which would hit water supply and force restrictions in parts of the country.
Why this is not the same story as the power one
We wrote about the low Danube once before, when it cut the Djerdap 1 hydro plant to a third of its output. That bill was measured in megawatts. This one is measured in liters, because the Danube-Tisa-Danube system feeds the canals that supply irrigation, putting farm production at risk in the middle of the season.
Agriculture Minister Dragan Glamocic framed it bluntly: “The water management system is facing one of its toughest situations in more than a century.”
What the state is doing
The Republic Emergency Headquarters met on July 28, chaired by Deputy Prime Minister and Interior Minister Ivica Dacic. Ten ministers attended, among them Adrijana Mesarovic, Bratislav Gasic, Dragan Glamocic, Sara Pavkov and Dubravka Djedovic Handanovic. Dacic told the session: “This is not a matter for one institution, but for the entire state system.”
Serbian Prime Minister Djuro Macut described the work on the ground:
We held an emergency session of the crisis headquarters today devoted to this problem. Intensive work is under way on removing underwater sandbars so that water intake can be redirected toward the pumping stations that fill the canals in the Danube-Tisa-Danube system
Clearing sandbars is dredging work, and it does not get done in a day.
The problem starts upstream
Rainfall is short across almost the entire Danube basin. Drought has gripped southern Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Czechia and Hungary since May, and the level at Bezdan depends on how much fell upstream. One rainy night in Backa will not move the gauge.
On July 30, Glamocic said he was tracking the water supply situation and called it alarming.
