Evacuation efforts are underway in Edirne, a main gateway from Turkey to Bulgaria and Greece and a province with a population of 400,000. It is facing the "worst floods of the century" according to local authorities. Some 5,000 people living near the banks of Meriç and Tunca, two rivers in the province, were stranded after Monday's floods. Authorities mobilized to help evacuation of the locals on Monday and yesterday.
A weather system of torrential rain hitting Bulgaria over the past three days led Turkey's northwestern neighbor to open the floodgates on its rivers in order to save its border towns from flooding. Six bridges on the rivers in Edirne were completely inundated, cutting off some neighborhoods' connection to the central province
The Turkish Prime Ministry's Disaster and Emergency Management Authority (AFAD) said in a statement yesterday that 466 people were evacuated from flooded areas by military vehicles, helicopters, cranes and rubber dinghies. Evacuated residents have been accommodated at schools and sports halls.
Karaağaç neighborhood was among the worst-hit in Edirne. Armored vehicles were dispatched to the neighborhood where thousands live to evacuate the residents. All roads to the site were still closed due to flooding yesterday. Military helicopters carried humanitarian aid to the flooded neighborhood.
No casualties were reported as a result of the flooding. The minister of Forestry and Water Affairs, Veysel Eroğlu, said that water levels observed on Monday night in the Edirne rivers were at a "record high." Eroğlu said that the sudden melting of snow that engulfed the region recently had led to the rise in levels.
Eroğlu said flooding in Edirne has become a common, seasonal event, and Karaağaç neighborhood has always been the most affected site. "We have a new project underway to divide the Meriç river by a canal so that it will bypass residential areas and will further contribute to irrigation of agricultural areas," he said. Eroğlu stated that building defenses such as embankments against floods were sufficient to a certain level, but flash floods always posed a risk.
The minister also called upon the Bulgarian government to take measures against the floods. "They built dams on the rivers but they failed to calculate flood volume," he said. Eroğlu said they had a "Plan B," adding that a dam will be built in the region "to collect the overflowing water."
