Blizzards, icy roads and dangerously low temperatures over the past two days have claimed more than a dozen lives in parts of Europe. The harsh winter weather has also cut off towns and caused massive power outages. Reports Deutsche Welle.
Four Portuguese tourists were killed and some 20 others were injured on Sunday when their bus skidded off an ice-covered highway in eastern France.
Authorities said the Switzerland-bound bus plummeted into a ditch in the Saone-et-Loire region near Lyon.
“It was very icy,” state prosecutor Karine Malara said. “The weather conditions this morning were very bad.”
Severe conditions across Europe have caused fatalities in a number of countries in recent days. Black ice across northern and western Germany was blamed for dozens of road accidents and injuries overnight. One person died near Hannover after their car skidded into a tree, the German Press Agency reported. Meanwhile, firefighters in the city of Hamburg said Sunday they had received 415 emergency calls for weather-related incidents.
