Another high water wave expected for major Dutch rivers later this month

The Rivierenland Water Board is expecting a fifth high-water wave on the large rivers at the end of this month. The water will not be as high as during the last two peaks, but it will be a high water level again. Seepage in the polders will increase again, and water in basements and crawl spaces will not disappear yet, the board said on Tuesday. Rijkswaterstaat also predicts that the Rhine, Waal, Lek, and IJssel water will rise again from Saturday. The discharge of the Maas will also increase again.

Seepage water is river water that seeps under the dikes at high water and rises again in the polders. Because the water levels have been high repeatedly since the end of November, there are many large puddles in the polders. Farmers suffer from this. At the moment, the seepage is subsiding a bit, according to Rivierenland, but from next week, the problem will increase again.

The groundwater also remains very high. As a result, some houses and buildings suffer from water in the crawl space. There is little to do about this except wait until the river water drops again, according to the water board.

On Friday, the Rhine at Lobith will drop below 10 meters above NAP for the first time in two months. The water level will then immediately rise again to around 13 meters above NAP.

The Rivierenland Water Board will leave the floating pumping station De Pannerling in the port of Arnhem. The pumping station belongs at Doornenburg in the Overbetuwe, but was moved when the Kolff pumping station in Hardinxveld-Giessendam could not adequately remove the water from the Linge. The board said that in view of the new high water wave, De Pannerling has not been brought back to Doornenburg.

Work on Weurt lock to disrupt inland shipping for months

Inland shipping from the north to the south of the country and vice versa can expect disruptions and detours until August because the Rijkswaterstaat is working on the Weurt lock near Nijmegen. Lock Weurt in the Maas-Waal canal connects the Maas with the Waal and the Rhine and is the main passage for commercial shipping on the north-south route. Approximately 29,000 inland vessels pass through the lock every year, according to Rijkswaterstaat.

The east chamber of the lock is closed until January 26. The water manager is installing new cameras there. Depending on the work, the west chamber will then close completely or partially. Rjikswaterstaat is replacing the gears that drive the lock gates, and they must be put on jacks for this purpose. New cameras will also be installed in the west chamber, painting will be done, and damage from collisions will be repaired. From May 31 to July 31, ships longer than 110 meters won’t be able to sail through the west chamber at all.

The Weurt lock’s east chamber dates from 1928. The west chamber was built in 1975. The complex requires major maintenance. Rijkswaterstaat has been working on tasks that cannot wait for several years. The major renovation will start in 2028.