Snow and slippery conditions can cause further disruption. There are restrictions on flight operations at Frankfurt Airport. Even in the morning nothing works on some highways.
In East Hesse, the winter weather in the morning continues to cause massive traffic disruptions on the A4, A5 and A7. A police spokesman said there are currently several kilometers of traffic jams on all motorways. Nothing was working on Wednesday evening: several trucks blocked the lanes due to the weather conditions. According to the police, many people were unable to continue driving in the morning due to the icy road. The situation was “very problematic,” it said.
There were also disruptions on the motorways in the south of North Rhine-Westphalia. On the A3, traffic was backed up for over 20 kilometers from Lohmar to Bad Honnef. “Due to stationary trucks, cars can sometimes pass through, but it’s actually still – I’ll put it cautiously – a bit chaotic,” said a police spokesman about the situation on the A3.
On the A4, traffic between Düren and Aachen-Laurensberg was backed up for over 20 kilometers in both directions. On all the highways in the southwest, it happens from time to time that trucks get stuck sideways or can’t make any progress on inclines, said a police spokesman.
Snow and slippery conditions also caused long traffic jams on the A7 in northern Hesse. Since the night there has been no progress on the entire section between Guxhagen and Homberg-Efze, as a police spokesman announced in the morning. The reason for this was several trucks that blocked the road due to slippery conditions. Drivers will be cared for on site. It was unclear in the morning how long the traffic jam was.
Many flights canceled
Due to the ongoing risk of ice, many flights were canceled at Frankfurt Airport. There are no buses in Cologne due to the winter weather. The weather situation remains tense in parts of Germany due to freezing rain and snowfall: The German Weather Service (DWD) is expecting lots of snow today.
German weather service lifts severe weather warning
The DWD lifted all severe weather warnings in the morning. This was announced by the DWD in Offenbach. Since Wednesday, warnings about black ice, for example, have been in effect in large parts of the country.
The precipitation area is slowly shifting from the center to the south today. “The risk of black ice caused by freezing rain is decreasing significantly,” said the report on the weather situation. “In the south, the surfaces of the streets and paths are too high for freezing precipitation due to the previous weather.” There the rain turns into snowfall.
From the Eifel and the Cologne area via the Rothaar Mountains to Thuringia, people have to prepare for “persistent and sometimes heavy snowfalls”. The DWD expects “storm-like amounts of fresh snow” of up to 30 centimeters within 24 hours and warns of “significant traffic disruptions and the risk of snow breakage.” “Snowfalls repeatedly lead to traffic disruptions, especially in the lowlands,” observes the DWD.
The DWD also predicted snowfall for the southeast half, initially rain for the extreme southeast, later snow there too. Otherwise, according to the forecast, there will be isolated snow showers, with breaks in between. Sunny winter weather can be expected across Germany towards the weekend.
Big traffic chaos even at night
During the night there were already massive traffic disruptions due to the weather on several motorways in Germany. According to an initial police estimate, around 2,000 people were stuck in kilometer-long traffic jams on the A3 in northern Rhineland-Palatinate. According to the police, traffic came to a standstill in both directions, particularly between the Bad Honnef/Linz and Neustadt/Wied junctions.
Because trucks got stuck on the snow-covered road, nothing worked on the A4, A5 and A7 in East Hesse. In addition to road maintenance vehicles, Red Cross support vehicles are on duty to provide drivers with blankets and hot drinks in the cold, a police spokesman said. According to this, several trucks in particular blocked the lanes because they were either no longer able to drive up gradients due to the wintry conditions or had sometimes slipped across the road.
There were numerous accidents during the night due to the persistent slippery conditions. When five vehicles collided on the slippery A44, six people were injured, some of them seriously. According to the police, several cars and trucks collided one after the other because they skidded or were no longer able to brake in time. The material damage was estimated at around 120,000 euros.
The DWD advised drivers to ensure that, in addition to a sufficiently full tank in the car, they have warm clothing and blankets as well as warm drinks and food. The German Alpine Club warned: “Heavy snowfalls can cause branches and tree tops to break off. Some of them fall to the ground, some of them are still hanging in the trees.”
Frankfurt Airport affected
Frankfurt Airport also canceled hundreds of flights today. A Fraport spokeswoman said this morning that more than 300 of a total of around 1,000 flights had been canceled. Both takeoffs and landings are currently possible again. It is still unclear whether the number of cancellations will increase over the course of the morning.
Due to freezing rain, aircraft take-offs at Germany’s largest airport were temporarily suspended. Fraport justified this by saying that the machines could no longer be safely de-iced before take-off due to persistent freezing rain. Individual planes have been able to take off again since the afternoon.
Munich Airport, however, has returned to normal operations after the weather-related disruptions. There are currently no restrictions due to slippery conditions or freezing rain, a spokesman said this morning. The airlines have not currently canceled any flights. Snowfall was expected in Munich in the afternoon. However, the airport expected to be able to cope with this.
Rail: Train service started in the morning without any major disruptions
There are no major disruptions at Deutsche Bahn (DB) this morning. A spokeswoman in Berlin told the German Press Agency. “DB train services started in the morning without any major disruptions.” In some cases, however, there may still be restrictions due to the weather. Passengers should therefore find out about their connections in advance.
Due to the ongoing winter weather, the Cologne transport company buses are not running today either. A spokesman said early in the morning that the weather conditions did not yet allow safe operation. Delays should also be expected with the light rail. Bus operations had also been suspended in Bonn for the time being. The responsible Bonn municipal utilities announced that whether the buses would run again today should be reassessed in the morning.
School cancellations are expected today due to the weather conditions. Among other things, school lessons are canceled in the Göttingen district of Lower Saxony. The administration announced that night that all types of schools in the city in the Göttingen district were affected.