Visited Devecser and Kolontár with the Hungarian Red Cross today. This is a relatively poor part of Hungary. Around 30-40% of the population is Roma [Gypsies]. Fortunately, the pre-schools and schools are situated on relatively high ground along with most of the other public buildings and do not appear to have suffered much damage.
I met briefly with the head of the disaster relief operation there and asked whether any orphanages, nursery schools, kindergartens or elementary schools had been affected and what the estimated cost of repair was. He said they had just started to assess the damage but said he would get back to me in a few days.
Several hundred people had to abandon their homes along with all of their possessions. Most have found temporary shelter with relatives. Some 30 people are living in a temporary shelter set up by the Hungarian Red Cross in the sports hall of an elementary school. Another 20 children and their parents are staying at the parish house in Devecser. As in the case of Alsozsolca during the floods, the lower lying homes (where the poorer people tend to live) were the worst affected.
The sludge is not radioactive. However, it is very corrosive and contains a high concentration of heavy metals. Low lying regions of the affected areas are uninhabitable. (Apparently it is not enough to treat the deluted areas with gypsum, lime, and sulphuric acid–the harmful affects of the sludge can only be neutralized by removing the top 2 meters of top soil–physically impossible given the size of the affected area). My understanding is that hundreds of homes are to be demolished and their residents permanently resettled elsewhere.
Over two hundred people are in hospital (including a number of children). To date five people have died. Three are reported missing but presumed dead. Frankly, it’s a miracle so few died. You can see from the attached pictures that the sludge reached a height of 2 meters in some places. Had the retaining wall broken at night hundreds would have been buried alive.
In addition to the Hungarian Red Cross, the Order of the Knights of Malta, Caritas, and a number of other charitable organizations are actively distributing food, clothing, cleaning agents, etc.
As we were leaving Devecser I noticed that the main park–the former castle park–had been completely destroyed.
We delivered about $1,500 worth of supplies including plasticware, cleaning materials, and personal hygiene products to the local Red Cross and the parish house shelter.
