At least five people have died in swimming accidents in Germany since Friday, as the heat prompted people to head to lakes and rivers.
berlin: At least five people have died in swimming accidents in Germany since Friday, police said, as a heat wave sent many seeking respite from the cold in lakes and rivers, the German Press Agency (dpa) reports.
A 27-year-old man drowned in the Neckar River near the southwestern city of Heidelberg on Saturday, while a 30-year-old man died in a lake near Mannheim, police said. A child was also reported missing in the Rhine-Herne Canal in western Germany.
The body of a 40-year-old man was recovered from a lake near Frankfurt in the central state of Hesse.
On Friday, a 45-year-old man died after being pulled from the water in a lake near Dortmund, while an 8-year-old boy was found dead after being searched in a lake near Hanover.
On Friday, the bodies of two elderly swimmers were also recovered from Lake Constance, on Germany’s border with Switzerland and Austria, who had jumped into the water from a rented boat the previous day and disappeared.
Germany has been in the grip of extreme heat for several days, with temperatures reaching 40 degrees Celsius or more in many places.
