Weather - Snow in NRW - winter services busy, several accidents
Winter has North Rhine-Westphalia in its grip at the beginning of the week. According to the German Weather Service in Essen, snowfall since Sunday evening has brought one to four centimetres of white splendour to the lowlands. Freeway and road maintenance services, especially in the west and south of the state, have been working non-stop since Sunday with the onset of precipitation to clear snow from the roads or to combat black ice with salt.
"Our highway maintenance services have a lot to do," said a spokesperson for Autobahn GmbH in the Rhineland on Monday. Hundreds of employees were also working in the megacity of Cologne to clear snow and ice from roads and footpaths, according to the responsible waste management company. The state road operator Straßen.NRW reported that "all available employees have been working on winter road maintenance" since Sunday.
Because more than a third of Straßen.NRW's workforce had called a warning strike as part of the collective bargaining negotiations for the public service of the federal states, road users would have to expect uncleared roads and black ice on Tuesday, the state operator announced. The consequences cannot be estimated at present, said a spokeswoman. However, it is foreseeable that two tunnels will be closed because they cannot be adequately monitored. The tunnels affected are the Menkhauser Berg tunnel in Oerlinghausen (Lippe district) and the Engelbert tunnel in Gevelsberg (Ennepe-Ruhr district).
However, there were still plenty of accidents on slippery and snow-covered roads on Sunday evening and Monday: For example, a 26-year-old woman skidded after overtaking a truck near Ruppichteroth near Bonn and crashed into a tree. The police are still investigating whether the partially icy road was the cause of the accident.
In the administrative district of Cologne alone, the police counted 47 weather-related accidents by mid-morning. "However, there was no snow chaos here," said a spokesperson. In the Rhine-Erft district, police officers have been deployed more than 30 times since midday on Sunday due to the weather - for example due to a rear-end collision with two minor injuries at a traffic light in Frechen.
Near Niederkassel in the Rhein-Sieg district, a female driver also suffered minor injuries when her car overturned on a snow-covered road. It landed on its roof next to the road. Near Lohmar, the car of a 28-year-old female driver collided with the blade of an oncoming snow clearing vehicle after it skidded, according to the 28-year-old. In Linnich in the district of Düren, a 34-year-old woman skidded in her car and crashed into two house walls. She was also slightly injured.
Meteorologists were expecting more flakes during the course of the day - but the snow would increasingly turn to rain as temperatures rose, said Nadine Schittko from the German Weather Service in Essen on Monday. Especially in the south and at higher altitudes, there was a local risk of black ice on the still cold ground. Slippery paths were also the reason why the zoo in Wuppertal closed its gates to visitors on Monday.
However, the snow cover will only last for a short time, at least in the lowlands: "On Tuesday we will mainly have rain," said Schittko. In the mountains, however, the danger of freezing rain will persist until Tuesday morning.
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- Despite the snowfall, the Rhineland area, particularly its flatlands, has been a focal point for the autobahn Gmbh of the federal government and their highway maintenance services since Sunday.
- Cologne, located in North Rhine-Westphalia, also experienced significant snow accumulation, and the city's waste management company deployed numerous employees to clear roads and footpaths.
- Straßen.NRW, the state road operator, mobilized all available employees for winter road maintenance since Sunday, but a third of its workforce went on a warning strike, which could impact road users on Tuesday.
- Although many drivers encountered accidents on icy and snow-covered roads in Cologne and its surrounding districts, police reported that there was no city-wide snow chaos.
- A 26-year-old woman overtook a truck near Ruppichteroth and crashed into a tree, with the police investigating whether the partially icy road contributed to the accident in the Rhineland.
- In North Rhine-Westphalia, the police had to attend to more than 47 weather-related accidents and responded to various incidents, including a collision due to black ice at a traffic light in Frechen.
- Drivers also experienced accidents in the Rhineland, such as a female driver in Niederkassel whose car overturned on a snow-covered road, and a 34-year-old woman who crashed into two house walls in Linnich after skidding on ice.
Source: www.stern.de
