Budapest Flooding

This last Sunday the Danube River reached a peak height of 8.95 meters as it flowed through Budapest. That broke the record of 8.6 meters set in 2006. Fortunately, the flood walls along the Danube in  downtown Budapest are 9.3-meter in height. The water still did a lot of damage and completely covered roads along the Danube. Thousands of workers and volunteers came out to fill sandbags to try to minimize the damage. 
We took pictures of the Danube as we were traveling to and from various places this weekend. Normally the river flows gently through Budapest and is filled this time of year with cruise ships and tourist boats. Since the river is so high and the space passing under the bridges of Budapest so limited, no boats are allowed on the Danube. We have never seen the Danube flowing so quickly. 

View of the Danube on the Buda side near Margit Bridge.

What you see in the river are platforms that are normally used to access boats. The gang planks

are usually accessed from the street to the platforms.

Workers sandbagging an area near Margit Bridge

Street lights and traffic signals where a road normally runs along the Danube on the Buda side. 

You can see Parliament in the background.

 Parliament as seen across the Danube. Normally there are two roads running in front of Parliament. 

As you can see, the river is right up to Parliament's steps.

A gangplank that normally accesses the boat from the street.

View of Batthyany ter, on the Buda side of the Danube.

The metro stop was closed here and sandbags surrounded all vents and entrances to the subway.

View of Margit Bridge from the Buda side. You can see how quickly the Danube is flowing and how little space there is between the water and the bottom of the bridge.

This is normally a street in front of the gang plank you see here.