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Snowy weather causes traffic accidents around Germany

DPA/The Local
DPA/The Local - [email protected]
Snowy weather causes traffic accidents around Germany
Trucks clearing snow on roads near the Black Forest on early Tuesday morning.

Winter weather has come to Germany for the first day of December, bringing snow and slippery roads.

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Several states reported traffic accidents early Tuesday morning, which police attribute largely to a lack of winter tyres. 

Police in Kassel, Hesse, reported 13 accidents caused by the weather, with a total of nine serious injuries. 

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A further 24 injuries occurred in the area around Darmstadt. An articulated lorry skidded on the B47 near Bensheim and the trailer was torn off. The road remained temporarily closed for rescue work. 

The weather also caused problems on the roads in Baden-Württemberg. Around Pforzheim, for example, the police counted eight accidents due to slippery roads until early Tuesday morning.

A think layer of snow and ice in the centre of Frankfurt on early Tuesday morning. Photo: DPA

In southern Lower Saxony, several vehicles were involved in crashes due to black ice on the Autobahn 7. On a sloping stretch between the Drammetal junction and the Lutterberg junction, there were at least three crashes during the night, a police spokesman said early Tuesday morning. 

The road to the north was temporarily closed off, with the opposite lane only accessible in one lane. According to the police, there were no injuries.

Deutsche Bahn did not report any train delays or accidents due to the weather.

Snow coats several parts of Germany

But the weather also brought some nicer news. At higher altitudes in Thuringia, the first flakes fell during the night - for example, the winter sports resort of Oberhof in the Thuringian Forest was wrapped in a glistening white blanket.

The snow also coated several cities in the south of Germany, including in the states of Rhineland-Palatinate and Bavaria, bringing icy walkways.

Temperatures in the south are expected to hover between 0 and 2 degrees C on Tuesday.

Vocabulary

caused by the weather - witterungsbedingt

accidents - (die) Unfälle

glaze/black ice - (das) Glatteis

wrapped/draped - gehüllt

We're aiming to help our readers improve their German by translating vocabulary from some of our news stories. Did you find this article useful? Let us know.


 

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