(Berlin) The storm that swept through Germany on Friday left at least one dead, nearly 60 injured and considerable damage mainly in the west of the country, local authorities said on Saturday.
Posted at 11:08 a.m.
In Rhineland-Palatinate, a 38-year-old man died after suffering an electric shock when entering a flooded cellar due to bad weather, and falling on his head, Koblenz police said.
North Rhine-Westphalia was particularly affected: a tornado crossed Paderborn injuring 43 people, including 13 seriously, the mayor of the city of some 150,000 inhabitants, Michael Dreier, said on Saturday at a press conference. .
“It’s shocking to see how much can happen in a city at such speed,” he said.
The column of the tornado progressed towards homes, taking away trees and sections of buildings, as videos posted on social networks showed. The police estimated at “several million” euros the “damage” it caused.
This phenomenon, extremely rare in Germany, also hit the municipalities of Lippstadt and Lütmarsen, two other towns located a few dozen kilometers from Paderborn, the German meteorological services said on Saturday. No injuries were reported.
The storm, which came after several days of unseasonably high temperatures in the country, caused widespread damage in this region of western Germany, with response forces reporting countless uprooted trees and roofs ripped off.
The south was also affected: in the Roth region, a wooden hut where hikers had taken refuge collapsed. Fourteen people were seriously injured, including a woman and a child, local Bavarian police said.
The German weather services lifted storm warnings on Saturday.
The violence of the bad weather on Friday is linked to the arrival in Germany of particularly hot air from Spain and France, on the one hand, and cold air from the north on the other, the meteorologist explained. Özden Terli on ZDF public television, speaking of an “explosive mix”.
Spain is experiencing an unusual heat wave that could make May 2022 the hottest month of the century in the country. France, for its part, equaled a spring heat record, with 38 consecutive days above seasonal norms.
The multiplication of heat waves, particularly in Europe, is a consequence of global warming, according to scientists, for whom greenhouse gas emissions increase the power, duration and rate of repetition of heat waves. .