Europe News

More deaths in European cold spell; snow wreaks havoc in south

Feb 4, 2012, 14:57 GMT

The centre of Amsterdam is covered with snow, The Netherlands on Friday 3 February 2012. The whole country is covered in snow after the first snowfall of this year. EPA/EVERT ELZINGA

Kiev - A spell of freezing weather in Europe has caused more than 220 deaths, mostly in the east and particularly in Ukraine, where the authorities reported 21 more fatalities on Saturday.

Ukraine's large population of homeless - estimated to number at least 100,000 people - were the most vulnerable to the frost, with temperatures regularly reaching -30 degrees Celsius. The consumption of alcohol is often an additional deadly factor in the freezing cold.

Eight new deaths were registered in Poland and four more in Romania. A homeless man froze to death in Prague, becoming the fourth victim of the cold spell in the Czech capital.

Berlin had its coldest night of the winter, at -19 degrees. Winter fun turned deadly in the German state of North-Rhine Westphalia where a Dutch national fell through the ice while skating on a lake Friday.

France's second victim of the cold had Alzheimer's, as did the first. The elderly woman had wandered off from a nursing home in Toulouse.

In Switzerland, temperatures as low as -34 caused some of the country's usually punctual trains to run late. It remained far warmer, however, than the record -41.8 degrees recorded in the 1980s.

To the south, the deep-freeze of previous days eased, but was replaced by massive snowstorms.

Montenegro reported its first victim of freezing, as road services struggled with avalanches tumbling onto roads which often lead through ravines in the mountainous country. The authorities advised people against driving until conditions improved.

Rescuers were still trying to reach some 60 people trapped when an avalanche sealed both ends of a tunnel on a main road. According to mobile phone communications with people inside, nobody was injured.

A snowstorm brought Serbia to a virtual standstill, fueling criticism of the authorities' apparently inadequate reaction to the snowstorm.

Traffic was crawling at best across Serbia and the authorities ordered that all schools remain shut next week to reduce traffic jams and energy consumption.

A statement on Friday by Infrastructure Minister Milutin Mrkonjic, that the snow 'has fallen at a bad moment,' caused an avalanche of outrage and ridicule in reactions on news forums.

It also snowed heavily in Bosnia where, as daily Dnevni Avaz reported, Sarajevo airport was closed and Serbian President Boris Tadic was stuck after a regional conference on Friday.

Rare snow, combined with a powerful gale from the sea, also hit the Croatian coast and islands.

Across the Adriatic to the west, Italian authorities were also being blasted by the public after Rome was paralyzed by 10 centimetres of snow - the most that has fallen on the Italian capital since 1985.

The snowstorm reached as far south as Algiers, on the northern shores of Africa, where children danced at the sight of snowflakes they had never seen before.