At least 120 dead as floods sweep western Europe

At least 120 people have died and hundreds more in western Europe are unaccounted for after some of the worst flooding in decades.

Record rainfall caused rivers to burst their banks, devastating the region.

In Germany, where the death toll now stands at over 100, Chancellor Angela Merkel called for a determined battle against climate change.

Belgian media is reporting 22 deaths there. The Netherlands, Luxembourg and Switzerland are also affected.

In Germany, the states of Rhineland-Palatinate and North Rhine-Westphalia were the worst-hit.

Scientists have repeatedly warned that human-induced climate change would bring pulses of extreme rainfall such as this one.

In the western German district of Ahrweiler, up to 1,300 people are unaccounted for, the authorities say. A spokeswoman for the local government said mobile networks had been put out of action, making it impossible to contact many people.

The village of Schuld (population 700) was almost entirely destroyed. In the town of Erfstadt-Blessem, near Cologne, floodwaters caused a row of houses to collapse. Local authorities said they were receiving emergency calls from people trapped by floodwater but rescue was in many cases not possible.

A major dam near the Belgian border, the Rurtalsperre, overflowed slightly but did not break, officials said.

In the Netherlands, the town of Valkenburg was one of the worst affected, where flooding forced the evacuation of several nursing homes.

Households have built makeshift dikes out of shopping bags filled with sand and a bridge has collapsed. Fire crews are pumping water from beneath the toppled slabs of concrete to access a gas pipe and stem a leak.

The country has reported no casualties but thousands of people in towns and villages along the Meuse river have been urged to leave their houses quickly.

In the Dutch city of Maastricht, 10,000 people were ordered to evacuate.

Source: BBC