photo: https://newsrnd.com/life/2022-02-19-hurricane-%C2%BBzeynep%C2%AB--what-germany-still-has-to-do.HyM7msjAy5.html/DB: Storms, damage, repairs, statistics, all traffic resumes
The storms in Europe hit hard in many places, Germany included. Weather experts speak of the worst storm since Kyril in 2007. 6,900 kilometers of rail networks were affected by damage and the repeated storms didn’t make it any easier on the clean-up crews.
DB had to put in 2,000 employees working non-stop but thanks to this effort managed to repair the vast majority of the damage within a short period of time. 1,000 kilometres of broken overhead lines had to be replaced and hundreds of bent and damaged poles repaired.
“Our repair crews were faced with major damage. I would like to thank all employees for their tireless commitment in this difficult and challenging situation for DB,” says Ronald Pofalla, Deutsche Bahn Board Member for Infrastructure.
Because of the safety issues DB had temporarily suspended train services in the northern federal states and in North Rhine-Westphalia. Despite all the trouble DB still showed care for the travellers on these routes. DB provided information about the current train offers, drinks and meal vouchers, organized the onward journey by bus or taxi and helped with the search for accommodations. 7,000 vouchers for taxis and hotels were issued by DB to help with this effort. The majority of the passengers influenced by this extreme weather were able to reach their destination on the same day or spend the night in a hotel.
"We would also like to thank the travellers who reacted to the exceptional situation with great understanding. We are aware that many planned trips over the weekend fell victim to the storm. But the safety of our passengers and employees is our top priority," says Berthold Huber, Board Member for Passenger Transport.
There is also some interesting data that came from this. More than 130,000 calls were made to the free special DB hotline to inform the affected travellers. Up to 350 employees serviced the call centres focused on this task. The information pages on bahn.de were accessed around seven million times and around 340,000 push notifications regarding the storm were sent via the “DB Linienagent” app for regional traffic.