13 killed by force of storm Emma

HURRICANE-force winds across Europe at the weekend killed 13 people and left a trail of destruction, as cars were blown off the road, roofs were ripped offand trees fell like matchsticks.

The storm, dubbed Emma by forecasters, saw winds of up to 200 kilometres an hour and heavy rains as it ripped its way across central Europe.

As the winds eased slightly yesterday Germany reported five dead, Austria had four fatalities, two died in the Czech Republic and two lives were lost in Poland.

In Rhineland-Palatinate in south-eastern Germany, a driver was crushed when a tree fell on his car, while a 72-year-old man in Bavaria in the south-east died when wind pushed his car into the path of an oncoming lorry, police said.

Also in Bavaria, six people were hurt when their bus was blown off the road and into a ditch. A total of 150,000 homes in Bavaria were without electricity, with heavy rain causing flooding, police said.

Across Germany, roads and railway lines were closed, roofs were ripped off houses, cars were overturned and power lines put out of action.

Authorities said tens of millions of euro worth of damage has been caused.

In Austria, where winds reached up to 166km per hour, two German tourists were killed on Saturday in separate incidents.

In the central Salzburg province, a taxi passenger was killed by rockfall apparently caused by the storm and a woman was crushed in Lower Austria when a tree squashed her car.

About 10,000 homes in Upper Austria were without power, roads and sections of motorway had to be shut.

In the Czech Republic, an 11-year-old girl died after a tree fell on her in Libeznice, near Prague, while an 80-year- old man died when a metal roof fell on top of him near Nymburk, in the east of the country.

About 40 people had to be evacuated from a block of flats in Prague after its roof was ripped off, and 100,000 people were without electricity in the western Karlovarsky region.

There also two reported fatalities in Poland.

In the Netherlands, flights to and from Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport suffered severe delays as only one runway could be used for take-offs and landings.