Evacuations continue Friday in the Balkans as floodwaters on the Danube River flow toward the Black Sea.
Authorities evacuated 2,000 people from the northwestern Bulgarian city of Vidin. Evacuations also are reported in Nikopol, and further downstream riverside buildings in the port of Ruse are flooded.
In Romania, officials had a gap cut in a major dike in order to flood uninhabited areas and protect low-lying fishing villages and farmland.
More than 5,000 Romanians remain unable to return home, down from the 7,000 earlier this week.
Heavy rains and melting snow have caused the Danube to flow at nearly twice its normal volume, causing some of the worst flooding in eastern Europe in years.
Tens of thousands of hectares of land are swamped in the region.
The Danube is a key shipping route between Western Europe and the Black Sea.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP, AP and Reuters.