Storm in Germany: "In the morning it was still completely blue sky"

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Floods after heavy rain in Wernigerode, Saxony-Anhalt

Photo: Matthias Bein / picture alliance / dpa

Lightning struck, heavy rain flooded cellars and underpasses, cars were washed away: In many places in Germany, storms caused immense damage at the weekend.

In many places the fire brigade had to move out several times within a short period of time.

In East Hesse alone there were hundreds of missions - in the Fulda district as early as 330 on Saturday afternoon. The main focus was on flooded streets, squeezed out manhole covers and full cellars.

At the main train station in Stuttgart, the water was up to 30 centimeters high at times, as a police spokesman said early Sunday morning. The water could not drain quickly enough, among other things due to blocked gullies. On Friday, a worker died in a tunnel construction site in Stuttgart when heavy rain hit scaffolding. A twelve-year-old was seriously injured in Düsseldorf after lightning struck near her group of cyclists on Friday evening. The girl was believed to be electrocuted and fell onto the street, where she was hit by a car.

In the Zwickauer Land in Saxony, an underpass under the Autobahn 4 was flooded.

"A car was up to the top in the water and had to be towed," said a police spokesman on Sunday.

An underpass at an exit from the federal highway 93 also had to be closed due to meter-high water masses.

According to the fire, the town of Langenweißbach in the Ore Mountains was also badly affected.

“The small local fire brigade had 35 missions in a few hours.

The water ran straight through the village. «Streams overflowed their banks, and numerous cellars had to be pumped out.

The storm in Zwickau and the surrounding area occurred very selectively, around 5 p.m. and 7 p.m.

“We got around 170 calls.

The sky was still completely blue in the morning, "said the fire department spokesman.

Only for Wednesday do the meteorologists promise that the weather will calm down

In Thuringia, the municipality of Wutha-Farnroda with its district of Mosbach was particularly affected, where on Friday evening a tidal wave streamed knee-high through the town and flooded houses, gardens and garages, as the district announced.

Several cars were swept away, and people had to be freed from three of them.

The mayor expected damage amounting to millions, and a building was feared a partial fall from a landslide.

There were also landslides in Hennef in North Rhine-Westphalia after a storm on Friday evening.

A car was washed into a stream, the area of ​​a swimming pool was covered with mud and rubble, and a road running through the forest was almost completely undermined on one side.

The German Meteorological Service announced for the Sunday "individual strong thunderstorms during the day in a strip stretching from eastern Lower Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt via Thuringia and western Saxony to Bavaria and the east of Baden-Württemberg."

According to the forecast, local storms must be expected, especially from heavy rain.

On Monday night, "heavy rain with local storm potential" could fall, especially in the south.

Only for Wednesday do the meteorologists promise that the weather will calm down.

wbr / dpa