EUCOM, USACE help with Sava River flood mapping

A panoramic view of the Sava River (Photo by Bojan Jaksic, Sava River Commission)

If you live near a river in Eastern Europe, you probably spent a horrific summer evacuating or preparing to evacuate due to floods. So, what better way to reach out to our partners than developing a plan to prevent and prepare for flooding, while promoting international cooperation?

I recently attended a plaque dedication ceremony for the Sava River hydraulic flood mapping workshop where representatives from Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Slovenia and Croatia attended. The flood modeling efforts were funded by EUCOM and built by the US Army Corps of Engineers in cooperation with the four nations. As the U.S. Ambassador James Foley said, “This work is invaluable and represents the type of projects that can be made through regional cooperation. It’s my hope that this spirit of cooperation can continue to lead to concrete results and I believe that this flood risk mapping will form the basis for follow-on work between the signatories of the Framing Agreement on the Sava River Basin who have cooperated so well today.”

The executive secretariat of the International Sava River Basin Commission (ISRBC), Dr. Dejan Komatina commented that it will be this regional cooperation that will sustain the (ISRBC) on issues related to navigation, economic development, comprehensive water management and environmental protection.

The mouth of the Sava River (Photo by Vlada Marinkovic, Sava River Commission)

In light of the ISRBC efforts and recent flooding in Central Europe this summer, the timing of the Sava River workshop was impeccable. The Sava is the third longest and the largest discharge of water to the Danube River contributing almost 25 percent and is an important asset to the Danube’s biological and landscape diversity, according to the International Sava River Basin Commission website. The river runs from Slovenia to the Danube in Serbia.

I am proud and honored to know this $100K project will greatly benefit the citizens and future generations of Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Slovenia and Croatia. Not only will it provide greatly enhanced flood modeling to help prepare for flood mitigation, but the cooperation necessary to make it successful is also the key element necessary for regional stability and economic development. And EUCOM was an instrumental part of that!

Greg Zielinski,
CAPT, CEC, US Navy
“HA all the way…for the Love!”

U.S. European Command
J-4 EN Division Chief