STORMS AND FLOODS.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LIII, Issue 57, 16 June 1910, Page 5

STORMS AND FLOODS.

WHOLE VILLAGES WRECKED. BRIDGE COLLAPSES. CROWDS OF PEOPLE HURLED INTO THE WATER. ■DEVASTATION EVERYWHERE-. By Cable—Press Association—Copyright Berlin, June 14. Floods and bursting dams drowned 150 persons in the Ahr Valley and 175 in other districts in Germany. The victims included 100 at Blankenstein, 50 at Adenau, and 25 at Hoennigen. The majority were labourers, who were sleeping in huts. Telegraphs are down and railways interrupted. The Aihr is subsiding.

[Received June 16, 12.30 a.m. Berlin, June 15. Twelve bridges were destroyed in the Ahr Valley. Engineers and infantry are constructing temporary substitutes. Several villages were wrecked. The Oberammergau river rose rapidly and flooded the roads and the railway, isolating the town, and threatening the Passion Play Theatre. The bridge over the Ahr at Sohulda was crowded with people watching the flooded river when the bridge collapsed. It is reported that 150 deaths were caused. Forty-nine bodies have already been washed ashore. The Valley of the Meuse was devastated, and smaller rivers rose fifteen feet in an hour. Many bridges were destroyed, and the towns and countryside are flooded, drowning thousands of cattle and sheep. DAMAGE IN VIENNA. Vienna, June 14. A torrential storm in this city caused great loss. Trains had to suspend their running and 1500 cases of damage are reported.