Merkel describes German flood devastation as ‘terrifying’

The German Chancellor expressed shock after visiting the flood-hit region and promised financial aid in the wake of the disaster.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has described the flooding that ravaged parts of her country as “surreal” and “terrifying”, as the death toll from floods in Western Europe climbed above 180 with dozens still missing. Merkel promised on Sunday swift financial aid after visiting one of the areas worst affected by the record rainfall and floods that have killed at least 157 people in Germany alone in recent days, in the country’s worst natural disaster in almost six decades. “It is terrifying,” she told residents of the small town of Adenau in the state of Rhineland-Palatinate, one of the two hardest-hit regions in western Germany. “The German language can barely describe the devastation that’s taken place.”