Heavy rainfall caused major chaos in Germany on Friday, with flooding in several regions.
A heavy storm in the southern German state of Bavaria caused flooded roads and cellars, and fallen trees caused inconvenience.
Roads were whitewashed with hailstones, according to a police spokesman in the city of Kempten, southwest of Munich. Between 6 p.m. (1600 GMT) and midnight, emergency services reported about 320 hail incidents.
The worst hit were the Allgäu region and the Lindau district, near Lake Constance and the border with Austria. Follow-up work, including pumping out cellars, continued into the night.
Another 230 operations were recorded by the police station in the city of Rosenheim, further east. Emergency services responded to flooded cellars and trees that had fallen onto roads and sometimes tracks. No injuries were reported.
Meanwhile, heavy rainfall in parts of the northern state of Lower Saxony caused further disruption, causing basements and streets to flood.
Emergency services in the Bentheim region, near the Dutch border, were particularly busy on Friday. More than 100 incidents were recorded in the town of Nordhorn.
Flooding temporarily closed a hospital emergency room, while overflowing reservoirs caused further damage to residential areas. Several roads were closed at times, with around 200 firefighters called to respond to the flooding.
Further south, strong wind gusts caused €130,000 ($142,000) in damage to several residential buildings, including a retirement home, in the town of Dissen, located in a forest near Osnabrück.
The German Meteorological Service expects local thunderstorms on Saturday and Sunday, which will bring further heavy rainfall to Lower Saxony, especially in coastal areas.
