Damaged crops and cyclists in the riverbed: How drought has devastated the Danube

The water level has dropped so much that, as the Danube has receded, it has revealed a series of relics that have long been hidden underwater...

For centuries, the rock was considered a warning. When it began to emerge from the Danube, beneath Gellért Hill in Budapest, it meant that the river level had dropped so much that the floating mills could no longer function, crops were likely to fail, and famine would almost certainly follow. Therefore, in the Hungarian capital, where over time the rock became more than a legend, it was called the “Ínség-szikla,” which means “Famine Rock.”

Today, amid record low water levels in the Danube, the rock has not only risen above the surface, but has emerged almost intact, along with the sandy riverbed on which it rests. This has astonished geologists and government scientists sent to examine the site. And, just as the rock was said to warn, Hungary is now facing an unprecedented energy crisis, which has forced the country to shut down all but one of its Danube-water-cooled nuclear reactors for the first time in 44 years.

The Guardian has travelled more than 160 kilometres along the banks of the Danube, the European Union’s longest river, which supports the livelihoods of the 10 countries it flows through. The journalists have visited villages and towns where residents are struggling to secure drinking water and farmers are struggling to keep their crops alive.

Pocsmegyer

Last week, Hungarian Prime Minister Peter Magyar warned that the economic damage caused by this year's drought is expected to exceed that of the historic dry spell that devastated Hungary's farmlands in 2022.

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Although it is still difficult to assess the full extent of the losses, Istvan Somogyi, a 56-year-old farmer from Pócsmegyer, a village on the Danube in Pest county, has already done his calculations.

"I've lost almost 50% of my harvest this year and it could be as much as 70%," he said. "Everything is gone. Everything has dried up. Since I started working this land after the end of the communist regime, I've never seen such a disaster."

Somogyi said the unprecedented crisis did not come out of nowhere and that heat waves and droughts in previous years had already given warning signals.

Scientists say the climate crisis caused by human activity is making every heat wave in the world more intense and more likely.

"We saw this coming," he said. "Last year's harvest was very poor. But we were lucky, because the Danube had a high water level. Despite the extreme heat, there was still enough water in the ground. This time there is no hope of saving the harvest," he added.

On the almost deserted roads that run alongside the river, families with children sought relief from the heat in the shallow waters of the Danube. Meanwhile, not far away, military trucks were drawing water from rural wells and transporting vital supplies to the reservoirs that feed the local network.

Szentendre

Across the river from Pócsmegyer, on the other bank of the Danube, is Szentendre, a town known for its artistic community. During the hottest days of the heat wave, some evening performances have been held by candlelight in an effort to reduce electricity consumption.

Here, in recent weeks, large desert-like islands have appeared. The exposed riverbed is cracked like a mosaic of hard, dry clay, baked by the stifling heat that has pushed temperatures in Budapest close to 42°C, while at night temperatures have reached 28°C.

Europe is warming faster than any other continent, as extreme summer temperatures and prolonged droughts are being exacerbated by the climate crisis caused by human activity. Extreme conditions continue to fuel wildfires and strain water supplies.

In some segments of the Danube near Szentendre, it is now possible to walk across the river, as the water barely reaches above the ankles.

“Swimming and boating are prohibited here,” said László Balázs, 44, head of the local river rescue service. “But people trying to escape the heat still enter the water, not knowing that it can suddenly become very deep in some areas, where they risk drowning,” he added.

In late June, Budapest police (BRFK) said three people had gone missing in the Danube over a single weekend. Police later found a body near Iváncsa, while searches downstream continued for the other two missing swimmers.

The drought and the resulting power outages have also left several Hungarian towns facing drinking water shortages. In a room inside the Szentendre tourist information office, thousands of bottles of water have been stored for distribution, especially to elderly residents and others in need.

“About 4,000 to 5,000 families were left without water,” said József Gulyás, 62, the deputy mayor of Szentendre. “We distributed 25 tons of water and received about 100 emergency calls a day. We had never experienced anything so serious. Elderly women hugged the workers who brought them water and burst into tears.”

Budapest

Traveling from north to south, towards the Hungarian capital, Budapest, where the Danube's level under normal conditions averages 2 to 3 meters and can rise as high as 8 meters, intense summer heat and persistent drought caused the river level to drop to a record low of just 14–19 centimeters on August 4.

The water level has dropped so much that, as the Danube has receded, it has revealed a number of relics that have long been hidden underwater, including the remains of a woolly mammoth, a bridge in Budapest destroyed after World War II, a Nazi warship and an unexploded British bomb.

The water is so low in the capital that on July 28, at around 16:30 p.m., Gábor Kürti, president of the “Magyar Kerékpárosklub” (Hungarian Cyclists’ Club) and owner of a bicycle freight company, left his office in central Budapest, got on his bike and, in an unusual adventure, rode 30 kilometers along the exposed bed of the Danube, while his journey quickly went viral on social media.

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"I wanted to show that, if you can cycle along the Danube bed for 30 kilometers, that means that, because of this climate emergency, we have literally hit rock bottom," he told The Guardian.

Using his KTM X-Strada 20 gravel bike, Kürti set off from the mouth of the Szilas stream (Szilas-patak) and rode through fine gravel, large rocks, packed sand, and mud, eventually reaching the ferry terminal in Vác, about three hours later.

“For many people it was an incredible adventure. For me it was shocking,” he said. “Riding my bike through parts of the river where, as a child, I would swim or kayak and which I could now cross by bike filled me with an indescribable sadness. It was like looking at the site of a terrible accident. Throughout that journey, the scale of the disaster unfolded before my eyes,” he said.

Nagyteteny

Kürti took The Guardian to what was just a few months ago a magnificent riverside forest in Nagytétény, called Kis-Háros-sziget, a protected area where creepers, wild vines grow and several families of European beavers live.

The river is reached by walking on land that would normally be several meters under water. Here, a branch of the Danube has receded so much that its flow has suddenly ended, blocked by the exposed riverbed left behind by the drought.

Its dry, clay-like surface looks like a glimpse into a future shaped by the worsening human-caused climate crisis. But it's happening now.

Pedestrians walk across what was once a river, their feet sinking into patches of mud. Kayakers try to wade through the shallow channels that remain. Many eventually give up, hoist their kayaks onto their shoulders, and walk home.

Hungarian authorities have been pumping water into large areas of the country's nature reserves, such as the one in Nagytétény, to prevent marshy areas from drying out as the drought worsens.

Paks

Continuing south, the road finally reaches Paks, home to Hungary's nuclear power plant, its towers rising above the horizon. Here, municipal workers have been working even on weekends to keep more than 700 endangered trees alive and to water the city's flowers.

“I have been doing this job for 18 years,” said Szilvia Farkas, 39, who works for Dunakom Zrt in Paks, a company wholly owned by the municipality, where she deals with planting and watering trees and plants.

"In all the years I've been doing this job, I've never seen so much vegetation wither and I've never worked so hard as I have this year to try to keep it alive."

Dunakom Zrt uses its own drilled well to extract water. In addition, the company can also obtain water from a settling tank. Currently, the public is not allowed to use tap water for irrigation. Instead, residents collect grey water (used water from sinks, showers or bathtubs) and use it to water their gardens.

In the most marginalized and poorest areas of the country, the water crisis has exacerbated long-standing problems for thousands of people who were already living in difficult conditions before the drought, with inadequate access to running water and sanitation systems.

Géza Orsós Renáta, 43, who lives with her four children on a small farm on the outskirts of Paks, has never had running water at home. Orsós, who also works for Dunakom Zrt, helping to irrigate public green spaces that are drying up in the heat, has long relied on a neighbor's water.

“Even in winter, we have to pump water and heat it in large containers so we can wash,” she said. “Now a friend brings us water once a week. But the situation is becoming unbearable,” she added.

Driving back from Paks, high, thick clouds occasionally appeared on the horizon above the clear Budapest sky, giving the impression that the rain would return. But by evening they would disappear, dashing the hopes of an entire country.

For now, there's not much people can do except cling to the hope that the "Hunger Rock" will once again disappear beneath the Danube, returning to the depths of the river and once again becoming something more than a legend.

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But Somogyi, who grew up hearing the story of the rock passed down through generations and is now witnessing the consequences of the warning it was believed to bring, knows that won't happen.

"The drought will return next year," he said. "That's the trend. And there's not much we can do," he added.