Polish floods breach more defences

Hundreds of people have been evacuated

WARSAW, Poland -- More dykes have been breached on Poland's swollen Vistula River as floodwater that has swamped much of the south of the country continues to surge downstream.

Flood defences soaked by the highest river levels in four years collapsed in some places on the Vistula on Monday, inundating settlements earlier evacuated by emergency services.

About 1,300 people were moved from the villages of Kepa Gostebcka and Kepa Solecka before floodwaters burst the dike near Kamien, about 105 miles from the capital Warsaw.

Five hundred emergency workers and 180 troops were trying to repair the dyke, breached along a 44-yard stretch. Further upstream at Annopol, work was under way to try to strengthen another flood defence that had begun leaking.

"The dykes are as soft as butter and as soaked as sponges," Lech Sapula, head of the anti-flood operation in the southern state of Swietokrzyskie region, told PAP news agency.

Some 25 people have been killed by the floods and violent storms in Poland this month, including 12 since the situation worsened last week. Thousands have also been forced out of their homes.

The flood wave was expected to crest in Warsaw on Monday night. Emergency crews are on alert and have stationed fire engines and boats near possible weak points as the water crept higher. But city officials said they were confident river dykes would hold.

On Sunday, a village and some 10,000 acres (4,000 hectares) of land were swamped after a 50-yard (metre) breach on the Vistula near the historic town of Sandomierz.

The town itself is protected after more than 4,000 emergency workers and civilians managed to shore up dykes overnight. About 3,000 people were evacuated from Sandomierz on Saturday.

Another 1,800 were moved by boat, bus and private car from six villages flooded near Zalesie Gorzyckie and Zlota.

Downstream, in Lubelskie region, attempts were under way to patch up a 10-metre breach in a dike near Laziska which flooded farmland.

The floodwater is due to reach Warsaw early on Tuesday, but is not expected to cause a serious threat to the capital.

A massive clean-up operation is under way in areas hit by the flooding earlier last week, including Lower and Upper Silesia, Malopolska and Podkarpacie provinces.

Storms and torrential rains have swept across Poland since July 10, flooding property in the Baltic port city of Gdansk and sweeping away houses in southern Poland.

The floods are the worst since the summer of 1997, when storms and rampaging rivers swamped 46,000 homes, killed 55 people and caused an estimated $3.4 billion in damage.