Degelo no Danúbio arrasta Embarcações

A natureza está sempre pegando alguma peça, em algum lugar do mundo, à nossa autoconfiança quanto à segurança de nossas embarcações. A última é esta, no rio Danúbio, em plena cidade de Belgrado, onde o degelo liberou grandes pedaços de gelo que se movimentando livremente provocaram grandes estragos às estruturas ribeirinhas, como restaurantes, e afundaram barcos. Uma situação que traz à mente o ocorrido em São Lourenço

Vast blocks of ice, moving freely on the Danube after a sudden weekend thaw, crushed and sank dozens of boats, pontoons and floating restaurants in Belgrade on Monday, and many others - lodged in ice - were carried downstream.

Hundreds of boats and floating restaurants have been damaged by the frozen ice.

Temperatures in Serbia rose from minus 20 degrees Celsius (minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit) last week to 10C on Sunday, melting packed ice more than 30 cms (11 inches) thick, after weeks of freezing weather that has affected most of Europe.

Boats owners at the Kapetanija marina in Belgrade's picturesque Zemun neighbourhood tried to winch boats and pontoons from river, boat owner Mihailo Svilaric told Reuters.

"We are trying to salvage whatever we can, only a handful of boats remained intact from about a hundred we had in the marina," Svilaric said.

People break ice which has seized part of the Danube River, in Belgrade.

Debris was scattered among the breaking ice for more than a mile along the river and several floating restaurants, barges and boats were torn from their moorings and beached on riverbank as fast moving ice snapped anchor lines.

"The ice was so fast that we could do nothing to prevent this," said boat owner Dragan Jovanovic. "The damage will be hundreds of thousands of euros (dollars) for sure."

Serbian authorities had used icebreakers on the Danube, Sava and Tisa rivers, but the ice built up too quickly and port authorities halted traffic on all waterways on February 8. (Reuters)