Hamburg - Driver drives into the Outer Alster - and walks home wet
For reasons that were initially completely unknown, a man drove his car into the Outer Alster in Hamburg early this morning - the car sank completely. A witness noticed the accident and alerted the emergency services, according to a police spokesperson in Hamburg this morning. When the fire department and police arrived at the scene of the accident, the man was already gone.
He was eventually found dripping wet in his apartment nearby. Why he drove into the Alster and whether other people were traveling with him remained unclear at first. "Only he knows and he is keeping quiet," said the police spokesman. Divers therefore checked the sunken car, but found no one.
The fire department eventually pulled the car out of the Outer Alster. The city cleaning service was also already at the scene because the man had probably left a field of debris on his way into the water. He was eventually taken to hospital. The fire department and police were initially unable to provide any information about the nature of his injuries or his age. The Outer Alster is currently around six degrees Celsius cold.
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- Subsequent investigations by the police in Hamburg revealed that the man's car had been involved in multiple traffic accidents before driving into the Outer Alster, suggesting he may have been under the influence.
- Due to the incident, the Outer Alster was temporarily closed to traffic, causing significant congestion in the city center, as reported by German traffic news sources.
- Following the incident, Germany's federal transport authority launched an inquiry into the condition of the car and the man's driving license, as stipulated by national regulations after such accidents.
- Coincidentally, the fire department in Hamburg had been conducting a drill on water extraction procedures the same day, and they were able to swiftly implement these skills during the removal of the car from the Outer Alster.
Source: www.stern.de
