public holidays
Gloomy weather forecast for Christmas – mild and rainy
The weather in Germany should remain rainy over the holidays. photo
© Jens Kalaene/dpa
The dream of a white Christmas is long overdue. According to the German Weather Service, it will not only be quite mild, but also rainy – and with full streets.
Lots of clouds, lots of rain and lots of traffic – this is the forecast from the German Weather Service and the ADAC with a view to the upcoming Christmas holidays.
There is a risk of traffic jams on Germany’s roads due to the heavy travel traffic around the holidays. According to the ADAC, there could be disruptions, especially on Fridays, when commuter traffic meets holiday traffic. And on the second day of Christmas (December 26), the experts expect a high volume of traffic again, when many Christmas holidaymakers come home from their family visit, according to reports from Munich.
In Bavaria, the ADAC expects the lanes on the A3 Frankfurt-Nuremberg-Passau, the A8 Stuttgart-Munich-Salzburg or the A9 Munich-Nuremberg-Berlin to reach their capacity limits.
Bahn uses 80 special trains
On the other hand, there is good news from Deutsche Bahn, which has already reacted in advance to the expected high volume of travel around the holidays and has put 80 additional special trains with up to 40,000 seats on the rails – especially on the major main routes in north-south and east-west direction.
As far as the weather for the holidays is concerned, the forecast from the German weather service in Offenbach is less optimistic: lots of clouds, mild temperatures and repeated rain. Many clouds dominate the sky on Christmas Eve. Between Schleswig-Holstein and Brandenburg it rains at first, in the afternoon it stays mostly dry. The rest of the country will experience intermittent showers throughout the day. In southern Upper Bavaria, the DWD even warns of storms. The continuous rain is expected to bring up to 60 liters of precipitation per square meter in the Allgäu and 90 liters in the Allgäu Alps within 48 hours, and even up to 140 liters in congested areas. It will be the coolest in the north with 4 to 9 degrees, otherwise the temperatures are usually in the two-digit range – between 10 and 14 degrees.
On Christmas Day there are longer sunny periods in the south with temperatures between 9 and 15 degrees. In the north and east, the thermometer shows 5 to 9 degrees with overcast skies and frequent rain. The forecast for Monday is also windy and rainy. Temperatures remain mild between 7 and 11 degrees in the northern half and 9 and 14 degrees in the southern half. The wind will be moderate to fresh, strong gusts are possible in the north and in the middle.