Vicious Hail Storms in the Mosel

By: Anthony Gismondi

Monday, August 29 2011

From Johannes Selbach...

With sadness I have to report that our 2011 vintage took a beating, just before the finishing line. We were looking forward to a very good and finally plentiful crop.

Take a look at youtube and type in Hagel Zeltingen (hail Zeltingen) and you need not much explanation.

This happened Friday afternoon around 16:00 h. I returned from a trip through Asia this morning and spent the last 4 hours inspecting our vineyards which are not a pretty sight.

I estimate our 2011 vintage shrunk by 40% in course of that storm. Asie from that, thousands of cars are dented, their windows smashed, many roofs broken, etc., etc.

August 26th was not a good day.

The villages that were especially badly affected are: Veldenz, Brauneberg, Graach, Wehlen, Zeltingen, Loesnich, Kinheim, Kroev. Others suffered little and yet others nothing at all. Hail is a very local phenomenon but when you're hit, it gets very bad.

Sadly yours,

Johannes

Written By: ag

Anthony Gismondi

Anthony Gismondi is a Canadian wine journalist and one of North America's most influential voices in wine. For over 37 years, he has been the wine columnist for The Vancouver Sun. The twice-weekly column is distributed across Canada through the Postmedia Network to millions of readers. He is also the host of the BC Food & Wine Radio Show, which is broadcast in 25 markets across B.C. and available globally as a podcast on all the major platforms. He launched Gismondionwine.com in 1997, which now attracts more than one million monthly users from 114 countries. It remains a valuable resource, offering tasting notes, insightful wine stories, and videos for the trade and consumers. His extensive collection of videos featuring wine personalities is available on the Gismondi on Wine YouTube Channel.