European cities see unprecedented flooding

PASSAU, Germany -- Swollen rivers gushed into the old section of Passau in Germany Monday, as water rose in the city to levels not seen in more than five centuries.

The city was one of the worst-hit by flooding that has spread across a large area of central Europe following heavy rainfall in recent days.

At least eight people were reported to have died and nine were missing due to floods in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the Czech Republic.

"The situation is extremely dramatic," Herbert Zillinger, a spokesman for Passau's crisis center, told the AP.

Much of the city was inaccessible on foot and the electricity was shut down as a precaution, he said. Rescuers were using boats to evacuate residents from flooded parts of the city.

But with water from the Danube, Inn and Ilz rivers relentlessly pouring into the city, water was advancing into previously dry streets -- in one case going from dry to ankle-deep within half an hour.

Markers set in 1954, when the city suffered its worst flooding in living memory, have disappeared beneath the rising water.

The German news agency dpa said the water levels were the highest recorded since 1501 in Passau, a city of 50,000 people that dates from before Roman times.

Elsewhere, authorities in the Czech Republic said more than 7,000 people had to be evacuated as of Monday afternoon as the flood-swollen Vltava River continued to rise.

Those evacuated included residents of southern neighborhoods in Prague and the town of Terezin also known as Theresienstadt, the former Jewish concentration camp during the Nazi WWII occupation.

Prague's central sewage treatment plant was shut down Monday to prevent it being damaged. That means that the sewage from the capital goes directly to the river.