A line of violent thunderstorms swept across southern Germany on Tuesday evening, triggering flash floods, toppling trees, and leaving a trail of injuries and damage from Nuremberg to the Bavarian Alps. In the Nuremberg metropolitan area, the integrated fire brigade control centre received nearly 3,000 emergency calls within five hours — a volume local officials described as unprecedented. Firefighters and rescue services were deployed to around 1,100 incidents, ranging from flooded basements and submerged roads to collapsed roofs and traffic accidents caused by the storm. At least two people were severely injured, including one person struck by a falling tree in Nuremberg who was taken to a hospital trauma unit, according to emergency services. Several others sustained minor injuries.

Further south, in the Garmisch-Partenkirchen district, six Bundeswehr soldiers aged 18 to 26 were injured when lightning struck their bivouac site on the Hoher Brendten ridge near Mittenwald early Wednesday morning. Police said one 18-year-old appeared to have been directly hit; five soldiers suffered light injuries and one was moderately hurt. All were hospitalised, but authorities said no lasting damage was expected. In a separate incident, a school class from Baden-Württemberg camping on the shores of Lake Forggensee was forced to seek emergency shelter after their tents were drenched, with the group eventually housed in a gymnasium in Roßhaupten.

The storm also paralysed transport infrastructure. Nuremberg Airport suspended flight operations for roughly 80 minutes on Tuesday evening as emergency crews cleared fallen trees and repaired damage to roofs and water-logged areas. Three inbound flights were diverted and four departures delayed. A regional train on the line from Nürnberg Nordost to Eschenau struck a tree trunk that had fallen onto the tracks near Kalchreuth, damaging the train and forcing the evacuation of 25 to 30 passengers, who were transferred to replacement buses. As the weather system shifted southward on Wednesday, the town of Reutlingen was hit by hail and flooding, and the local grid operator FairNetz reported that around 6,000 households lost power overnight due to storm damage.

The extreme weather comes as Germany continues to grapple with the growing threat of flash floods. In 2021, the Ahr valley disaster claimed 135 lives, prompting a wave of investment in flood defences, including new retention basins, reinforced river walls, and redesigned bridges. The national weather service, DWD, has warned that the risk of heavy rain and isolated thunderstorms will persist across the southern half of the country through Thursday and possibly into Friday. Authorities are still assessing the full extent of material damage, and emergency crews remain on high alert.