Heavy rains cause flooding across Germany

By Erbil Basay

BERLIN (AA) - Heavy rains that began Wednesday evening persisted throughout the night, leading to widespread flooding across several regions of Germany, according to reports on Thursday.

In the state of Hesse, police responded to numerous locations affected by heavy rainfall and flooding. In Diezenbach, an underpass was temporarily closed due to flooding, as reported by German media outlets.

The city of Hanau and the Main-Kinzig region in Hesse saw flooded streets, overflowing manholes, and numerous fallen trees, further complicating local conditions.

In Bavaria, particularly in Aschaffenburg, heavy rains flooded streets and inundated building basements.

Meanwhile, in the eastern German states of Saxony, cities like Gorlitz and Bautzen also faced road flooding and basement inundations. In Bautzen, a train collided with fallen trees obstructing the tracks.

In the capital Berlin, the basement of the Central and State Library archives was flooded after a rainwater drainage pipe burst under the strain of heavy rainfall. Library staff worked urgently, forming bucket brigades to remove water and prevent damage to hundreds of thousands of books stored in the archive.

Jonas Fansa, a library director, described the situation to RBB television, emphasizing the unprecedented scale of flooding within their building.

"I have never witnessed such a volume of water in our facility," Fansa said.

*Writing by Merve Berker in Ankara