Evening edition · Monday, 26 October 2026
The Rhine at Kaub reads 55 centimetres, and the next front is on its way
A day after it cleared its 2018 low, the Kaub gauge has climbed by more than 20 centimetres. Storm Manja's remnants left, the warm front of NAOMI arrives in the north-west tonight.
The Rhine gauge at Kaub read 55 cm at 16:30 on Monday, according to the federal waterways’ PEGELONLINE service1. Desk arithmetic on the 15-minute readings: the mean so far today is about 53 cm, against 31.3 cm on Sunday and 24.5 cm on Saturday1. The service still classes the level as low against the long-term mean low water1.
The weather behind it. The German Weather Service said on Monday morning that the remains of storm Manja were moving off over the Norwegian Sea, with gusts of around 70 km/h on the North Sea coast and up to 95 km/h on exposed summits such as the Brocken2. On Monday evening the warm front of the next storm, NAOMI, west of Ireland, reaches the north-west half of the country2.
Why it matters. Kaub is the bottleneck gauge for Rhine shipping between the Upper and Middle Rhine. Every centimetre there is cargo a barge can carry instead of leaving at the quay. Rain upstream is, for once, a supply-chain story with a happy direction.
What to watch
- Whether Kaub holds above 50 cm through the week, which barge operators feel directly in their loads.
- The renewed southerly gusts of 60 to 70 km/h on the North Sea tonight2.
A river does not care about headlines. It answers rain, two or three days late, and it is answering now.
Sources
- Kaub (Rhein), water level, 15-minute values — WSV / PEGELONLINE, retrieved 26 Oct 2026, 16:40 CET.
- Warnlagebericht für Deutschland — Deutscher Wetterdienst, 26 Oct 2026, 06:37.
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