SEDAN - At least eight people have died and dozens are missing in Germany after heavy flooding turned streams and streets into raging torrents, washing away cars and causing some buildings to collapse.
Police in the western city of Koblenz said Thursday that four people had died in Ahrweiler County and that about 50 were trapped on the roofs of their homes awaiting rescue.
Six houses collapsed overnight in the town of Schuld. "Many people have been reported missing to us," police said.
Schuld is located in the Eifel, a volcanic region of hills and small valleys southwest of Cologne.
The full extent of the damage in the region was still unclear after many villages were cut off by floods and landslides that made roads impassable. Videos posted on social media showed cars floating through the streets and houses partially collapsed in some places.
Authorities have declared an emergency in the region after days of heavy rains that also affected much of western and central Germany, as well as neighboring countries, causing widespread damage.
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Police said two men, ages 77 and 82, died after their basements were flooded in the western cities of Kamen and Wuppertal, where authorities warned that a dam was threatening to explode.
Authorities in Rhine-Sieg county, south of Cologne, ordered the evacuation of several villages below the Steinbachtal reservoir amid fears that the dam could also break.
One firefighter drowned during rescue efforts in the western German city of Altena on Wednesday, and another collapsed during rescue operations at a power plant in Werdohl-Elverlingsen. A man went missing in the eastern city of Joehstadt after disappearing while trying to protect his property from rising waters, authorities said.
Rail connections were suspended across much of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany's most populous state. Governor Armin Laschet, who is running to succeed Angela Merkel as chancellor in German elections this fall, was expected to visit the flood-stricken city of Hagen later on Thursday.
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The German weather service DWD predicted that the rains would subside on Thursday.
Incessant rains overnight made flooding conditions worse in eastern Belgium, where one person was reported to have drowned and at least one other is missing.
Some cities saw water levels rise to unprecedented levels and their centers became gushing rivers.
Major highways were flooded and in the south and east of the nation, the rail service said all traffic was stopped, adding that "alternative transportation is highly unlikely."
In eastern Eupen, on the border with Germany, a man was reported dead after being swept away by a torrent, a local governor told the RTBf network.
In Liege, the main city in eastern Belgium, the Meuse River could break in the early afternoon and spill into the heart of the city. The police warned citizens to take precautionary measures.
Authorities in the city of Valkenburg, in southern Holland, near the German and Belgian borders, evacuated a residence and hospice overnight amid floods that turned the main street of the resort town into a river, Dutch media reported.
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The Dutch government sent some 70 soldiers to the southern province of Limburg on Wednesday night to help with tasks that include transporting evacuees and filling sandbags when rivers overflow. There were no reports of flood-related injuries in the Netherlands.
Unusually heavy rains have also flooded a swath of northeastern France this week, knocking down trees and forcing dozens of roads to close. A train route to Luxembourg was disrupted and firefighters evacuated dozens of people from homes near the border with Luxembourg and Germany and in the Marne region, according to local broadcaster France Bleu.
The equivalent of two months of rain has fallen in some areas in the past one or two days, according to the French national meteorological service. With the soil already saturated, the service forecast more downpours on Thursday and issued flood warnings for 10 regions.
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Raf Casert in Brussels, Angela Charlton in Paris and Mike Corder in The Hague contributed to this report.
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