Storms lash Europe leaving 15 dead
Powerful winds and heavy rain swept across northern Europe from Ireland to Russia over the weekend, leaving at least 15 dead by yesterday, inundating areas of Britain and disrupting air and sea transport. Hundreds of thousands of homes lost power.
High water in the Russian port city of St Petersburg forced the closure of some subway stations.
The storm was one of the worst to hit Scandinavia in years, with winds clocked in some areas at more than 75 mph. Some bridges and airports in Scandinavia were temporarily closed, and rail and ferry traffic was badly disrupted.
At least six people died in Sweden, including two whose cars were hit by falling tree branches. One motorist died in Denmark when a tree crashed onto his car in Odense, and three others were killed by debris and falling trees.
In the north German state of Schleswig-Holstein, wind damaged houses and forced the shutdown of train and ferry links and highway bridges. Two 20-year-old men whose kayak capsized on a lake near the town of Landwedel were missing and presumed dead, police said.
In St Petersburg, on the Gulf of Finland, cars ploughed through bumper-deep water on flooded streets, and six subway stations were shut yesterday morning because water levels on the gulf were dangerously high, a city emergency official said. Three stations were reopened later, he said.
In Finland, sea levels reached record highs, cutting off several coastal roads, but no major damage was reported. Rescue teams piled thousands of sandbags and large bales of recycled paper on the waterfront in downtown Helsinki near the president’s palace where the sea rose 5 feet above normal levels onto the streets and market place.
In Latvia, on the Baltic Sea, nearly winds as high as 90 mph buffeted the country’s coastal regions, toppling trees and tearing off roofs.
Emergency phone lines were overwhelmed by calls from frightened residents, and the military were called in to help clear roads and re-establish power and phone service
In Sweden, many roads were flooded. Bridges between the island of Funen, where Odense sits, and Zealand, where Copenhagen is located, were closed. But traffic began to return to normal yesterday.
More than 400,000 Swedish households were without power after the storm. In Denmark, about 60,000 households lost electricity.
