Rhine River hits historic low: Water levels disrupt European cargo transport

We're travelling on a ship taking iron ore from the port of Rotterdam... to a steel factory in Germany. But as you can see, they're taking a lot less than usual. Cargo ships on the River Rhine have reduced their weight significantly... to prevent hitting the riverbed. The Rhine is an important artery in Europe... transporting yearly around 300 million tonnes of cargo. The drought has now doubled transportation costs. Normally, we take 5,600 tonnes only in the ship and the barge. But now, what did we take? 2,100 tonnes. So actually, we need two and a half ships... to transport the same amount of cargo. The River Rhine is at some point less than two metres deep... while it normally, around this time of the year, should be around five, six, seven metres. So it's a real challenge for these large cargo ships to manoeuvre. German steelmaker ThyssenKrupp has suspended its own barges transporting ore... because of low water levels. To help production stay afloat, other shippers like Iris Dijs... carry small amounts to the company's factory in Duisburg. This is where the Rhine enters from Germany into the Netherlands. You can already see the very low water levels right there. Instead of more than 2,000 cubic metres per second of water... entering now less than 700 cubic metres per second of water are recorded. Meteorologists point at a lack of melting glacier water in the Alps... and extremely hot weather caused by global warming. Across the border here in Germany, the levels are even lower. Around 50 centimetres have been measured here at the Rhine. And you can easily see how high the levels are usually, up to 10 metres higher. And it's very rare for people to be able to even walk here. Germany has launched a nationwide information system... to better manage its dwindling water resources. In Germany, we have lost around 60 billion cubic metres of water in the past 25 years. You can see this in the low water levels in rivers, lakes and low ground water levels. The Netherlands has called for an immediate ban... on the use of river water for farmland in certain parts of the country. In Germany, people are also asked to save water. While some rain is forecast in the next few days... shippers are expected to continue manoeuvring low Rhine levels in the next few weeks. Stapfas and Al Jazeera from the River Rhine.