Wiesbaden (dpa / lhe) – Due to low rainfall, the water level of the Rhine is comparatively low for the time of year. The value at the Kaub level in the Middle Rhine Valley is currently just under 110 centimeters, which corresponds to a flow of around 940 cubic meters per second, as Cornelia Löns-Hanna from the Hessian State Agency for Nature Conservation, Environment and Geology (HLNUG) in Wiesbaden on Friday responded to a dpa request explained. If you look at the years from 1961 to 2020, around 90 percent of the daily discharges at the beginning of March would be above the currently determined value.
The Rhine up to the Hessian state border is mainly fed by tributaries outside of Hesse, for example from the Alps, the foothills of the Alps, the Black Forest, the Vosges and the Neckar catchment area. As Löns-Hanna explained, the lower amounts of snow in the Rhine catchment area could also lead to lower water levels in the river in the following months if this were not compensated for by heavy precipitation.
The expert explained that there is currently no low water situation in the inner Hessian waters. Currently, 9 bodies of water have above-average water levels, 93 bodies of water have average flow rates. Only 3 bodies of water are currently showing low flow rates.
While in January 2023 around a quarter more precipitation fell across Hesse compared to the reference period from 1991 to 2020, it was around a quarter less in February, as Löns-Hanna explained. “This low-rainfall period is still ongoing at the beginning of March.”
