View from the beautiful red wine trail, copyright: Silke Trömel
On 14 July 2021 Western Germany and the neighboring countries Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands experienced heavy rainfall with catastrophic consequences. The long-lasting intense stratiform rain caused extreme precipitation amounts above 160 mm over a region of the German states Rhineland-Palatinate and North-Rhine-Westphalia, and led to extreme floods especially but not only in the Ahr river (see also Oltermann 2021, Chen et al. 2022, Landesamt für Umwelt Rheinland-Pfalz 2022, Saadi et al. 2023, Tradowsky et al. 2023), located close to the PrePEP-Conference venue.
Apart from the dramatic flood event, the Ahr valley is famous for his beautiful red wine trail (see e.g. https://www.komoot.com/guide/269/hiking-in-the-ahr-hills). During the PrePEP-Conference, we offer on the afternoon of March 19, 2025, in collaboration with the State Environmental Agency Rhineland-Palatinate an excursion to the Ahr valley. In case of nice weather, the excursion also offers the possibility for a short hike on the trail and testing of local wine.
Participation requires prior registration until 16 February 2025 here. The attendance fee for the excursion is 25 Euro. More information will be available with the second announcement of the PrePEP-Conference.
References:
Chen, J.-Y., R. Reinoso-Rondinel, S. Trömel, C. Simmer, A. Ryzhkov, 2022: A Radar-Based Quantitative Precipitation Estimation Algorithm to Overcome the Impact of Vertical Gradients of Warm-Rain Precipitation: The Flood in Western Germany on 14 July 2021. Journal of Hydrometeorology, 24(3), 521–536, https://doi.org/10.1175/JHM-D-22-0111.1.
Oltermann P., 2021: At least 58 dead in Germany as heavy rains bring catastrophic flooding. The Guardian, 15 Jul 2021.
Saadi, M., C. Furusho-Percot, A. Belleflamme, J.-Y. Chen, S. Trömel and S. Kollet, 2023: How uncertain are precipitation and peak flow estimates for the July 2021 flooding event? Nat. Hazards Earth Syst. Sci., 23(1), 159–177, https://doi.org/10.5194/nhess-23-159-2023.
Tradowsky, J. S. et al., 2023: Attribution of the heavy rainfall events leading to severe flooding in Western Europe during July 2021. Climatic Change 176, 90 (2023), https://doi.org/10.1007/s10584-023-03502-7.
Landesamt für Umwelt Rheinland-Pfalz (State Environmental Agency Rhineland-Palatinate), 2022: Bericht Hochwasser im Juli 2021.
The Ahr river in Altenahr before flood in 2021, copyright: SGD Nord
The Ahr river in Altenahr after flood on 14 July 2021, copyright: SGD Nord
