Overall, the paper addressed an important aspect of these flood events; critical infrastructure failures. It is helpful for research to have such an account of CI interruption and recovery times in a paper. The paper presents findings based on a mix of research and newspaper sources, and own field observations. Three countries are covered, but the reports and findings are mostly on Germany. The overall structure could be improved a bit, but the overall documentation of damages is helpful for other researchers.

Content comments:

Page 4, line 85. Gas supply is almost fully restored. Yes, from the perspective of the utility providers. But many homes are still disconnected. There is a shortage of heating installations for the houses. But I guess, if this is what you mean by "almost", it is ok as it is.

2.3 Lines 99-104: it is correct, but maybe you need to add that in most laces, emergency sewage tanks have been installed, by THW and others.

Line 106: add a source, if you have

2.4 This section is quite short, by comparison. Since there is no conceptual order of critical infrastructure, and you also do not cover many more CI sectors/ branches; you may consider shifting this information in 2.4 to another section that summarises 'other impacts'.

Section 2 in general: I would suggest either having at least a sentence on each of the three countries in each sub-section (2.1 etc). Or, omitting short sentences such as "In The Netherlands, little to no problems have been recorded with regards to water supply." However,  especially Belgium is not mentioned in every sub-section yet.

2.6. For Germany, more hospitals heavily affected are missing (Erftstadt, Leverkusen). The paper is mixing overview information such as 105 general practitioner practices with one more elaborate example of one hospital; maybe you could add more overview information (x numbers of hospitals) as well.

Section 3

Section 3 has the same heading as section 2. And also the content appears to be the same.

So maybe it is better to merge both sections. Section 3 appears very much like miscellanous observations, the 2.7 'other'

However, the style is even more narrative and overall, it is not so clear, which fields the authors wish to cover and which not. And again, mainly Germany is covered.

Maybe this section could be divided into 

2.7 Roads (first para)

2.8 Bridges (third para)

And the middle para on shortages in flood zonation mapping be shifted to section 4?

Or, a new 2.9 on retention basins as infrastructure overlooked so far?

The information is fine and it is also fine that the authors cite themselves, it seems. However, maybe reduce mentioning the name of one author a bit; make it more elegant by replacing it by "the same study" or similar.

You could add similar studies on road and rail interruption studies such as by Atzl/Keller. But the paragraph itself is very important and very laudable that the authors observe further needs of assessment in (their) previous studies as well. And indeed, flood assessments now need many updates including bridges collapsing, sediment transport, tree transport and many more.

Lines 151-154 Interesting argumentation of the "counterfactual", but I agree that the static maps of riverine flood zonation do not match to (every) real event. Since they are based on scenarios that see all potentially flooded areas, irrespective of the flood waves (and duration of discharge). So if the message here is, that the study was counterfactual because the mining pit 'saved' other areas from being flooded, which was not captured by the study in 2020, or by the flood maps, it is correct and fine.

Section 4.

The three finding are not surprising and sound a bit generic, given the existing literature in science about this. But maybe it is still very important to stress these points once more after this important event, so as to hope to improve the risk management practices in Germany, at least.

This brief communication provides an overview of the impact of the July 2021 flood (Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands) on important (critical) infrastructure systems (Transport Infrastructure, Electricity and gas supply, Drinking water supply and waste-water, Solid waste, Telecommunication, Healthcare and education) as well as the progress in rebuilding these important systems. Problems in the field of risk assessment of infrastructure disasters are identified and statements are made for future activities to improve risk modeling for critical infrastructure. Thus, the draft meets the content requirements for a brief communication. Overall, the manuscript needs some revisions; however, the summary of information from media and other work is an important contribution to research on the highly topical example of a severe extreme event that was not foreseen and has highlighted our limitations in risk management.

Minor major comment:

• The authors should rethink the structure in Section 2 and 3.
  
  The argumentation of the paragraph L149-154 is interesting, but does not quite fit very well.

• Section 3 "Critical Infrastructure Impacts" really only addresses the transportation infrastructure aspect; can you please comment a bit more on the other topics discussed in section 2?

Minor comments:

• The following specifications for "Brief communications" from the publisher side were not met:
  
  https://www.natural-hazards-and-earth-system-sciences.net/about/manuscript_types.html
  
  „Brief communications have a … maximum 20 references, and an abstract length not exceeding 100 words.“
  
  Even if I find the aspect with the citations (caused by various media reports) less relevant and it is rather important to link/appreciate the work of others --> Decision of the editor/publisher
• L19: See also for Germany:
  
  Junghänel, P. Bissolli, J. Daßler, R. Fleckenstein, F. Imbery, W. Janssen, F. Kaspar, K. Lengfeld, T. Leppelt, M. Rauthe, A. Rauthe-Schöch, M. Rocek, E. Walawender u. E. Weigl (2021): Hydro-klimatologische Einordnung der Stark- und Dauerniederschläge in Teilen Deutschlands im Zusammenhang mit dem Tiefdruckgebiet „Bernd“ vom 12. bis 19. Juli 2021, Deutscher Wetterdienst 2021 https://www.dwd.de/DE/leistungen/besondereereignisse/niederschlag/20210721_bericht_starkniederschlaege_tief_bernd.pdf
  
  Maybe there are similar reports from the other two weather services for the respective country?
• Figure 1:
  
  A detailed integration of the relevant rivers in all three countries would be very desirable; it is unclear which data come from which dataset; How (and by whom) exactly was the flooded area determined? When is this flooded area evaluation from? Country boundaries could be a bit thicker for better distinguishability? The city names should be in English (e.g. Köln à Cologne); Why is the scale 200 - 225 mm used in the colorbar, when it is not used in the figure? This gives a false impression of the maximum values.
• L20: „Rhine“
  
  In Germany, the tributaries such as the "Ahr" and "Erft" were particularly affected.
• L23ff: Newly published "Press release from Munich RE from 2022/01/10“: https://www.munichre.com/en/company/media-relations/media-information-and-corporate-news/media-information/2022/natural-disaster-losses-2021.html
• L23ff:
  
  How are the loss amounts to be understood? Total loss or Insured loss; Direct loss or Indirect loss?
• The captions of Section 2 and Section 3 are identical.
• Figure 2: To avoid confusion; the damage was not on 11 August 2021, but the images are from the 11 August --> Recording date
• Figure 3 is not referenced in the text.
• L140 „…which hampers verification and validation with observed impacts.“
  
  Suggestion: Maybe add „on smaller scales“
• L140ff: I miss in the reference the detailed literature citation from “Van Ginkel et al. (2021)”.
  
  On which data/models are the estimations of the river flood risk based for all road segments in Europe?
• L141: “…for all road segments in Europe.”
  
  Really for all? Or only for a part of the "road categories" (e.g. highways, trunk roads,...)
• L143: „… relatively small rivers…“
  
  Please give examples
• L143: „During the event, …“
  
  Suggestion: „During the event in 2021, …”
• L143: I miss in the reference the detailed literature citation from “Dottori et al., 2021”.
  
  As this is already the second missing citation; please check again if all citations are mentioned in the references.
• L145: “…flow velocities at multiple places.”
  
  Could you provide values here and make an assessment of them?
• L146: „…correspondence to the model“.
  
  Unclear what exactly is meant; to the model in Van Ginkel et al.?
• L147: “Figure 2”
  
  Maybe better suitable: Reference to Section 2.1
• L157f: “…freeboard requirements.”
  
  Please explain.
• L171ff: Another problem here is that the data basis is miserable.
• Section 4:
  
  Comment from RC1: “The three finding are not surprising and sound a bit generic, given the existing literature in science about this. But maybe it is still very important to stress these points once more after this important event, so as to hope to improve the risk management practices in Germany, at least.”
  
  I agree with this statement

The authors present a “Brief Communication” on “Critical Infrastructure impacts of the 2021 mid-July western European flood event”. The collection of information is helpful, but only limited scientific conclusions are presented. However, presenting the material as a brief communication seems justified to me. I agree with the authors, that the material can be helpful for further studies. I also agree with the comments of the other reviewers so far. I recommend publication of the paper after some minor corrections.

I only have a few additional remarks:

Figure 1: More detailed rainfall maps for Germany and neighboring countries are available in this report: https://www.dwd.de/DE/leistungen/besondereereignisse/niederschlag/20210721_bericht_starkniederschlaege_tief_bernd.pdf?__blob=publicationFile&v=10 (e.g. Figure 6).

Section 2.4: Additional information on solid waste for the Ahrweiler region is available on the website of the ‘Kreisverwaltung’:

https://kreis-ahrweiler.de/es-waren-keine-abfaelle-sondern-erinnerungsstuecke/

Line 143: Dottori et al. is missing in the reference list.

Minor editorial remarks:

Line 60: „euro“ -> „Euro“; „40km“ -> „40 km“

Line 129: „euro“ -> „Euro“