Vacation-Bound W. Germans Spend 1st Night in Cars
Thousands of West Germans spent the first night of their summer vacation stranded in cars as a huge wave of southbound tourists created traffic jams up to 48 miles long, police said Saturday.
The massive exodus for the beaches in southern Europe coincided with the beginning of school vacation in North Rhine-Westphalia, the most populous West German state.
Heavy traffic and a series of minor accidents caused a jam 48 miles long between Wuerzburg and Munich late Friday, police said. No serious injuries were reported.
Thousands of vacationers were stuck in their cars for five hours until the traffic started moving again slowly at 4.30 a.m. Saturday, police said.
Traffic also crawled to a stop between Munich and Salzburg, Austria, on one of the busiest expressways to southern Europe, causing a jam 36 miles long.
At least nine other jams stretching up to 18 miles were reported in other parts of the country.
A Bavarian police spokesman complained, “We keep on giving traffic advisories, but no one is listening.”
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