Central Europe braces for heavy rains and flooding forecast over the weekend

PRAGUE (AP) — Central European nations braced on Friday for severe flooding forecast to hit the Czech Republic, Poland, Austria, Germany, Slovakia and Hungary over the weekend.

Czech authorities erected metal barriers or protective walls from sandbags, while water was released from dams to make space in reservoirs. Residents have been warned to get ready for possible evacuations.

Some public events planned for the weekend have been cancelled at the request of authorities, including soccer matches in the top two leagues.

“We have to be ready for the worst case scenarios,” Prime Minister Petr Fiala said after a meeting of his government’s central crisis committee. “A tough weekend is ahead of us.”

Meteorologists say a low pressure system from northern Italy was predicted to dump much rainfall in most parts of the Czech Republic, or Czechia, including the capital and border regions with Austria and Germany in the south, and Poland in the north.

Central Europeans are especially wary because some experts have compared the weekend forecast to devastating floods in 1997 in the region, referred to by some as the flood of the century.

Over 100 people were killed in the floods 27 years ago, including 50 in the eastern Czech Republic where large sections of land was inundated.

The biggest rainfall was predicted in the eastern half of the country, particularly in the Jeseniky mountains. The second largest city of Brno, located in eastern Czech Republic, is among places that have not had flooding protection work completed, unlike Prague.

Czechs were asked not to go to parks and woods as high winds of up to 100 kilometers (62 miles) per hour were forecast.

In Poland, Prime Minister Donald Tusk traveled on Friday to the southwestern Polish city of Wrocław where floods are forecast. Authorities appealed to residents to stock up on food and to prepare for power outages by charging power banks.

Tusk, meeting with firefighters and other emergency officials, said the forecasts were "not excessively alarming.”

“There is no reason to panic, but there is a reason to be fully mobilized,” he stressed.

The German Weather Service warned of heavy precipitation across swaths of the country, including the Alps, where heavy snowfall and strong winds are expected at higher altitudes.

The Alpine nation of Austria is also getting ready for heavy rains, and a massive cold front that is expected to bring snow to higher elevations.

The weather change arrived following a hot start to September in the region. Scientists have recorded Earth's hottest summer on record, breaking a record set just one year ago.

A hotter atmosphere, driven by human-caused climate change, can lead to more intense rainfall.

Associated Press writer Vanessa Gera in Warsaw, Poland, contributed to this report.

Firefighters adjust parts of the anti-flood barriers in Prague, Czech Republic, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

Firefighters adjust parts of the anti-flood barriers in Prague, Czech Republic, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

Firefighters adjust parts of the anti-flood barriers in Prague, Czech Republic, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

Firefighters adjust parts of the anti-flood barriers in Prague, Czech Republic, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

Firefighters adjust parts of the anti-flood barriers in Prague, Czech Republic, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

From left, Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala, Czech Interior Minister Vit Rakusan and Czech Environment Minister Petr Hladik attend a news conference after the meeting of Central Crisis Staff due to the risk of floods in Prague, Czech Republic, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024. At right is Czech Interior Minister Vit Rakusan. (Vit Simanek/CTK via AP)

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala, left, speaks during a news conference after the meeting of Central Crisis Staff due to the risk of floods in Prague, Czech Republic, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024. At right is Czech Interior Minister Vit Rakusan. (Vit Simanek/CTK via AP)

People with umbrellas against the rain as they cross the medieval Charles Bridge in Prague, Czech Republic, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

Firefighters adjust parts of the anti-flood barriers in Prague, Czech Republic, Friday, Sept. 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Petr David Josek)

NEW YORK (AP) — In what appears to be a sophisticated, remote attack, pagers used by hundreds of members of Hezbollah exploded almost simultaneously in Lebanon and Syria Tuesday, killing at least nine people — including an 8-year-old girl — and wounding thousands more.

A U.S. official said Israel briefed the U.S. on the operation — in which small amounts of explosive secreted in the pagers were detonated — on Tuesday after it was concluded. The person spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the information publicly.

The Iran-backed militant group blamed Israel for the deadly explosions, which targeted an extraordinary breadth of people and showed signs of being a long-planned operation. Details on how the attack was executed are largely uncertain and investigators have not immediately said how the pagers were detonated. The Israeli military has declined to comment.

Here's what we know so far.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah previously warned the group’s members not to carry cellphones, saying they could be used by Israel to track the group's movements. As a result, the organization uses pagers to communicate.

A Hezbollah official told The Associated Press the exploded devices were from a new brand the group had not used before. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the press, did not identify the brand name or supplier.

Nicholas Reese, adjunct instructor at the Center for Global Affairs in New York University’s School of Professional Studies, explains smart phones carry a higher risk for intercepted communications in contrast to the more simple technology of pagers.

This type of attack will also force Hezbollah to change their communication strategies, said Reese, who previously worked as an intelligence officer, adding that survivors of Tuesday's explosions are likely to throw away "not just their pagers, but their phones, and leaving their tablets or any other electronic devices.”

Even with a U.S. official confirming it was a planned operation by Israel, multiple theories have emerged Tuesday around how the attack might have been carried out. Several experts who spoke with The Associated Press explained how the explosions were most likely the result of supply-chain interference.

Very small explosive devices may have been built into the pagers prior to their delivery to Hezbollah, and then all remotely triggered simultaneously, possibly with a radio signal.

By the time of the attack, “the battery was probably half-explosive and half-actual battery," said Carlos Perez, director of security intelligence at TrustedSec.

A former British Army bomb disposal officer explained that an explosive device has five main components: A container, a battery, a triggering device, a detonator and an explosive charge.

“A pager has three of those already,” explained the ex-officer, who spoke on condition of anonymity because he now works as a consultant with clients on the Middle East. “You would only need to add the detonator and the charge.”

After security camera footage appeared on social media Tuesday purporting to show one of the pagers explode on a man’s hip in a Lebanese market, two munitions experts offered opinions that corroborate the U.S. official's statement that the blast appeared to be the result of a tiny explosive device.

“Looking at the video, the size of the detonation is similar to that caused by an electric detonator alone or one that incorporates an extremely small, high-explosive charge,” said Sean Moorhouse, a former British Army officer and explosive ordinance disposal expert.

This signals involvement of a state actor, Moorhouse said. He adds that Israel’s foreign intelligence agency, the Mossad, is the most obvious suspect to have the resources to carry out such an attack.

N.R. Jenzen-Jones, an expert in military arms who is director of the Australian-based Armament Research Services, notes that Israel had been accused of carrying out similar operations in the past. Last year, AP reported that Iran accused Israel of trying to sabotage its ballistic missile program through faulty foreign parts that could explode, damaging or destroying the weapons before they could be used.

It would take a long time to plan an attack of this scale. The exact specifics are still unknown, but experts who spoke with the AP shared estimates ranging anywhere between several months to two years.

The sophistication of the attack suggests that the culprit has been collecting intelligence for a long time, Reese explained. An attack of this caliber requires building the relationships needed to gain physical access to the pagers before they were sold; developing the technology that would be embedded in the devices; and developing sources who can confirm that the targets were carrying the pagers.

And it's likely the compromised pagers seemed normal to their users for some time before the attack. Elijah J. Magnier, a Brussels-based veteran and a senior political risk analyst with over 37 years experience in the region, said he has had conversations with members of Hezbollah and survivors of Tuesday's pager attack. He said the pagers were procured more than six months ago.

“The pagers functioned perfectly for six months," Magnier said. What triggered the explosion, he said, appeared to be an error message sent to all the devices.

Based on his conversations with Hezbollah members, Magnier also said that many pagers didn’t go off, allowing the group to inspect them. They came to the conclusion that between 3 to 5 grams of a highly explosive material were concealed or embedded in the circuitry, he said.

Jenzen-Jones also adds that “such a large-scale operation also raises questions of targeting" — stressing the number of causalities and enormous impact reported so far.jenzen

“How can the party initiating the explosive be sure that a target’s child, for example, is not playing with the pager at the time it functions?” he said.

Hezbollah issued a statement confirming at least two members were killed in the bombings. One of them was the son of a Hezbollah member in parliament, according to the Hezbollah official who spoke anonymously. The group later issued announcements that six other members were killed Tuesday, though it did not specify how.

“We hold the Israeli enemy fully responsible for this criminal aggression that also targeted civilians,” Hezbollah said, adding that Israel will “for sure get its just punishment.”

People donate blood for those who were injured by their exploded handheld pagers, at a Red Cross center, in the southern port city of Sidon, Lebanon, Tuesday, Sept. 17, 2024. (AP Photo/Mohammed Zaatari)