Expert opinion on the gravel pit: A lack of flood protection led to the accident

Reports available to the WDR show: the gravel pit in Erfstadt-Blessem was not protected as required. An expert speaks of a “disaster with an announcement”. The state government is bricking.

The catastrophe at the opencast mine in Erftstadt-Blessem in the course of the July flood could happen because there was no prescribed flood protection on the south side of the gravel pit. This emerges from two expert opinions that are available to the WDR. Accordingly, the accident in the summer of 2021 with massive landslides and collapsed houses is due to an “absolutely faulty construction” at the gravel pit.

Disaster still “difficult to imagine” for local residents

The southern side of the gravel pit borders on the northern residential area of ​​Erftstadt. The crater of the pit was formed by that flood growing in size last July, taking parts of the residential area with it. “It’s still hard to imagine the masses that were moved by the water,” says resident Thomas Dunkel.

Experts have examined the site: two reports were written on behalf of the city of Erftstadt and the Arnsberg district government responsible for mining. For the city, the engineering geologist Professor Lutz-Heinrich Benner comes to a clear conclusion in a report that has been kept secret up to now: The total damage to the more than 10 houses “are solely due to the opencast mining north of Blessem”, he analyses. This is clear in view of “the absolutely flawed construction of the flood protection wall based on loosely piled up material.”

Flood protection “did not meet the requirements”

At the time of the disaster, this embankment “did not meet the requirements for a technical flood protection structure according to the state of the art,” concludes mining expert Michael Clostermann on behalf of the district government. His report was presented to politicians in the state parliament in September.

Also for the district government, the expert Burkhard Lisiecki comes to the conclusion that “the probable flood dam” in the south of the opencast mine “with a probability bordering on certainty did not meet the requirements”. This is how he puts it in an e-mail that WDR has now been able to see.

Explosive: Nevertheless, the flood protection wall on the south side was “accepted without defects” by the responsible approval authority in the summer of 2015. RWE announced this in a statement. The energy giant is the parent company of the gravel pit operator RBS. “The flood protection wall met the requirements demonstrably and officially approved,” explains RWE in response to the WDR enquiry. Apparently there were no complaints from the supervisory authority about the condition of the wall, not even after a total of ten on-site appointments by the district government until spring 2021.

Serious allegations against the Arnsberg district government

The geographer Dirk Jansen from the Bund für environment and nature conservation (BUND) speaks of a “disaster with an announcement”. He evaluated the documents for the WDR magazine Westpol and makes serious allegations against the Arnsberg district government. As the mining authority, this is responsible for inspecting and approving the gravel pit. “The supervisory authority also failed here,” says Jansen.

House searches by the public prosecutor

The public prosecutor’s office in Cologne has been investigating for weeks. The accusation: negligent causing of a flood through omission and violation of the Mining Act. “It’s about the suspicion that there shouldn’t have been a flood protection wall in accordance with the official regulations on the south side of the gravel pit,” says senior public prosecutor Ulrich Bremer.

The statements of the experts, which are available to the WDR, now confirm this suspicion.

In mid-January, the investigators carried out extensive house searches, including at the owner and lessor of the opencast mine, as well as at the operating company RBS, the wholly-owned subsidiary of RWE – and at the Arnsberg district government as the supervisory authority.

Since the flood that killed 49 people in North Rhine-Westphalia alone, the state parliament in Düsseldorf has been dealing with the disaster again and again, including in a committee of inquiry.

The Ministry of Economics and Energy knew early on

Relatively soon after the events, it was also clear to the state government’s Ministry of Economics and Energy that the flood protection of the Blessemer gravel pit was defective. The house of Andreas Pinkwart (FDP) is the supreme mining authority responsible for the safety of opencast mines.

As early as August 25, 2021, a ministerial councilor formulated in a letter available to the WDR that there were doubts as to whether the “mandatory flood protection device on the southern edge of the old opencast mine area (…) existed or, if it existed, was adequately dimensioned and was able to adequately fulfill its function.”

Sensitive findings are not found in reports to the state parliament

In contrast, these significant concerns are not taken into account in information provided by the ministry to the state parliament. In its report for the meeting of the “Mining Safety Subcommittee” on September 17, 2021, the Pinkwart Ministry only addresses possible signs of problems with flood protection in three sentences.

For example, a relatively steep edge of the south embankment “needs closer examination and evaluation”. The seven-page report makes no mention of the serious suspicion that there could have been no mandatory flood protection. This is also not addressed in two responses to parliamentary questions from the opposition.

SPD parliamentary group wants to hear Pinkwart as a witness

Stefan Kämmerling, chairman of the SPD in the parliamentary investigative committee on the flood catastrophe, calls this constellation “dramatic” and announces the consequences: “The files from the Ministry of Economics are now urgently needed”, and Minister Pinkwart should also be summoned to the investigative committee. “It looks to me at the moment that he will have a lot to explain,” said Kämmerling.

When asked by WDR, the Ministry of Economics and Energy insists that it informed Parliament “promptly” about “the status of the findings” – and points out that the expert of the district government presented his findings on flood protection at the committee meeting in September .

Currently, the ministry does not want to further assess the flood protection of the gravel pit – as justification, it refers to the ongoing investigations of the public prosecutor’s office. Minister Pinkwart declined an interview request from the WDR magazine Westpol.

The WDR radio news reported on this topic on February 6th. The WDR magazine Westpol reports on Sunday evening at 7:30 p.m. on WDR television.

Source: wdr.de