The Schwingesperrwerk is a man-made movable barrier located on the Schwinge at its confluence with the

Elbe The Elbe ( ; ; or ''Elv''; Upper Sorbian, Upper and , ) is one of the major rivers of Central Europe. It rises in the Giant Mountains of the northern Czech Republic before traversing much of Bohemia (western half of the Czech Republic), then Ge ...

near Stade, Germany. It is part of the

flood control Flood management or flood control are methods used to reduce or prevent the detrimental effects of flood waters. Flooding can be caused by a mix of both natural processes, such as extreme weather upstream, and human changes to waterbodies and ru ...

program for the Lower Elbe tidewater region, from the

weir A weir or low-head dam is a barrier across the width of a river that alters the flow characteristics of water and usually results in a change in the height of the water level. Weirs are also used to control the flow of water for outlets of l ...

Geesthacht Geesthacht () is the largest city in the Lauenburg (district), District of the Duchy of Lauenburg (Herzogtum Lauenburg) in Schleswig-Holstein in Northern Germany, south-east of Hamburg on the right bank of the Elbe, River Elbe. History A church ...

to the mouth of the Elbe where it flows into the

North Sea The North Sea lies between Great Britain, Denmark, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, and France. A sea on the European continental shelf, it connects to the Atlantic Ocean through the English Channel in the south and the Norwegian Se ...

. Engineers constructed the Schwingesperrwerk after a storm surge caused severe floods in the region in 1962. Built between June 1969 to August 1971, the barrier protects the area surrounding the Schwinge. The construction costs of the barrier amounted to about 7.5 million Euro, in 2013 currency. Seven thousand cubic metres of reinforced concrete, 900 tons of rebar steel and 1,200 tons of steel sheet pilings were used in the construction. The structure is 34 metres wide and equally deep. The shipping bay, which has a clearance width of 16 metres, can be closed with two double gates. Their cill lies at 4.5m below normal ( NN), while the top of the gates is 7.6m above normal. The gates close at water levels of 2.4 metres above normal. Spanning the barrier is a double-leaf bascule bridge, more commonly known as a draw bridge, which is out of order. The barrier is managed by the executive agency Stade of the Lower Saxon State Department for Waterway, Coastal and Nature Conservation.

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* {{Disasters Dams in Lower Saxony Tidal barrages