Though Kyrill was not an extrem storm its footprint is impressive. The storm struck Europe with hurricane-force winds over the course of two days, causing significant flight, rail, ferry and power disruptions, flooding, and building damage over a large part of Europe including the United Kingdom, France, the Netherlands and Germany.
The work of the largest airports of Munich, Amsterdam, Vene, and Frankfurt has been disrupted. Ferries have been closed in Great Britain, Finland, France and Belgium. Fishermen were recommended to avoid going into the sea in Ireland and Latvia.
In Poland thousands of toppled trees blocked roads, nearly 800,000 homes across the country were left without electricity and hundreds of others were damaged. In North Rhine-Westphalia, a bigger part of Germany, reported loss of 25 mill trees.
In Germany railway service closed first time in history completly. Fireworkers were called more than 70,000 times. Nearly everybody felt the impact and had to change daily routine.
Prof. Dr. Peter Höppe, head of Geo Risks Research at Munich Re summarizes: “Kyrill has confirmed our recent forecast that this year’s unusually warm winter will go hand in hand with a particularly high windstorm risk. It fits into the pattern of climate change, which, in the long term, will intensify weather extremes in Europe too. Winter storms in particular will probably tend to be stronger.”
Picture credit: Meteoschweiz.ch
More pictures: Eumetsat.int, Daily Aqua (2007-01-18)
Videos: Hoher Peißenberg,
Stories: Gaisberg mit 216 km/h - Österreich-Rekord
AIR Worldwide Estimates Winter Storm Kyrill Will Cause Insured Losses between 4 billion and 8 billion in Europe
Munich Re: Winter Strom Kyrill: Typical for a warm winter
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