GERMANY - Snow, rain cause mayhem across Europe

BERLIN, Germany (AP):

Freezing temperatures and often blinding snowfall killed 12 more people and caused travel chaos across northern Europe yesterday, while some of the worst floods in a century devastated parts of the Balkans.

Airports closed down or delayed flights across the continent, roads were coated in an impassible mix of ice and snow and even Europe's vaulted, high-speed trains struggled to cope.

Authorities declared a state of emergency in three Balkan countries yesterday, Bosnia, Serbia and Montenegro, and were evacuating hundreds of people after heavy rainfall caused severe flooding along the Drina River, the worst in 104 years, officials said.

Tourist agencies in Bosnia handed over their rafts so Civil Protection workers could rescue people from apartments in Foca, where water levels have reached the first floor. Those who dared remain on upper floors were given food and water.

On the other side of the river, authorities in Serbia and Montenegro evacuated hundreds of people as the Drina flooded farms and roads. Schools were closed, many people had no electricity or heat, and water supplies were contaminated along the river in all three countries.

Overall deaths

In Poland, the cold claimed 10 more lives, bringing the overall deaths there to 18, police spokesman Mariusz Sokolowski said, as police scourged the streets for homeless or drunk people in hopes of saving their lives.

Authorities in Berlin kept subway stations, soup kitchens and heated buses open all night to provide shelter for the city's homeless, and thousands in Germany had to sleep overnight on trains, either stuck by the wild weather or due to a lack of hotel rooms.

Two deaths were reported in Germany, a 73-year-old in Lower Saxony who was struck by a train while trying to clear snow and an 18-year-old in Baden-Wuerttemberg, who lost control of his vehicle on an icy road and crashed into a truck.

Air travel was suspended. Gatwick Airport, one of Britain's busiest, was closed for a second straight day, cancelling another 600 flights as conditions continued to deteriorate. Edinburgh Airport and London's City Airport were also closed until at least late evening, according to Eurocontrol, Europe's air traffic agency.

Significant delays also hit airports at London Heathrow, Paris Charles de Gaulle, Amsterdam's Schiphol, Berlin's Tegel and Duesseldorf. In Geneva, the airport reopened only after removing 2,000 tractor-trailers full of snow from the runways.

Travelers hoping to fare better by road or rail were equally stymied as snow continued to fall across the United Kingdom and most of Germany, leaving thousands of motorists stranded overnight in their cars.

Some 3,000 stranded rail passengers struggled to sleep overnight in their trains, German railway operator Deutsche Bahn said. Another 200 passengers in Frankfurt spent the night in parked trains after local hotels fill to overflowing.

Nothing was moving along many of Germany's high-speed train links, such as between Nuremberg and Leipzig in the south and east, or between Hamburg and the Danish capital Copenhagen in the north.

Southeastern Denmark was also badly hit, and heavy snowfalls and icy winds severely hampered road and rail traffic. The Danish army used tracked armoured personnel carriers to help ambulances and other emergency vehicles cut their way through mounds of snow.