Romania will submerge thousands of hectares of farmland on the banks of the Danube to prevent the swollen river from flooding villages, Prime Minister Calin Tariceanu said on Friday.
Soldiers stacked sandbags around towns as the water level in the river - boosted by melting snow - rose to its highest level in more than a century in some areas, flooding ports and villages on the southern bank of the river in Bulgaria.
"We decided to pursue controlled flooding of farmland along the Danube to protect villagers who might be hit by rising waters," Tariceanu told reporters after an extraordinary cabinet meeting.
Tariceanu said experts predicted the Danube would hit flow levels in coming days not seen since 1895. The operation to submerge the farmland was expected to begin within days, an official from the waters department said.
About 90,000 hectares (222,400 acres) of fertile soil on a 400-km (250-mile) stretch of the river will be flooded. Romania, which cultivates wheat and maize on the river's northern bank, has yet to estimate potential losses.
In the Danube town of Fetesti, soldiers stacked 50,000 sandbags to protect it from rising waters, and emergency workers aboard small boats were cutting electricity cables to prevent short-circuiting.
"If the water rises a few more centimetres I'll lose everything I fought for in my life," said Paulina Clim, 44, whose courtyard was already submerged after a dam nearby collapsed.
Environment Minister Sulfina Barbu said meteorologists forecast no rain for the next few days, but heavy rains might occur as early as Wednesday.
So far, about 400 houses were inundated and 500 people were evacuated across Romania.
RECORD WATER LEVELS IN BULGARIA, HUNGARY In Bulgaria, the government maintained a state of emergency along the river but said mass evacuations were not necessary for now.
In the Danube town of Vidin, water levels rose to an all-time high of 9.5 metres (31 feet) and authorities feared some dikes might break under the pressure.
"The dikes are built to hold waters up to 10 metres, and our biggest worry is that some of them may give in," said Anatolii Tsnov, head of the civil defence in Vidin.
More than 250 houses were flooded by rising groundwater in villages near the swollen river.
In Lom, home to 6,000 people, civil defence officials scrambled to build a dike - the third new defensive barrier in as many days - and people surrounded their homes with sandbags after the river flooded a port and administrative buildings.
The waters also swamped a large part of Nikopol, a town 250 km (155 miles) north-east Sofia, and authorities were preparing to evacuate the city's 4,000 inhabitants, the head of the local crisis headquarters Aidan Ismailov told state agency BTA.
In Hungary, the flood alert has been lowered on the Hungarian section of the Danube, but its flooding to the south of the country has further boosted the level of the tributary Tisza.
Authorities declared on Friday an emergency situation on much of the river Tisza which is expected to rise to a record level next week. Authorities prepared cars, buses and trains to evacuate up to 40 villages should dams burst.
"We are expecting big water on the Tisza, probably the highest level ever recorded," Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsany told a news conference.
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