
At least four people including a young girl have died after flash floods and hail storms wreaked havoc across Germany, destroying houses and sweeping away cars.

One man aged around 60 drowned in an underground car park when it filled with water too quickly for him to be able to escape in the southwestern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg.

In the town of Schwaebisch Gmuend, a firefighter was killed as he tried to rescue another person in a flooded railway station who then also died.

Elsewhere in Baden-Wuerttemberg, police said a 13-year-old girl was killed after being hit by an intercity train while apparently seeking shelter from the storm under a railway bridge.

The flooding is the latest fallout from a severe storm that hit much of Germany and Europe over the weekend, with a series of lightning strikes leaving one dead and dozens injured across the continent.

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Trail of destruction: Debris and rubble can be seen piled up in a residential street after heavy storms hit the German town of Braunsbach

Carnage: Flash floods and hail storms have wreaked havoc across Germany, destroying houses and sweeping away cars and lorries

Cars are buried under debris in Braunsbach, Germany, where torrential rainfalls caused two small brooks to burst their banks

Cars are submerged in an underpass in Oberhausen after torrential rains caused flash floods across southern Germany

Submerged cars are abandoned in a flooded underpass in Oberhausen, Germany, as torrential rain caused havoc across the country

Police looks at partially submerged cars standing abandoned in a flooded underpass in Oberhausen, Germany, on Monday

Cars are seen in a flooded street in Schwaebisch Gmuend, where a firefighter die as he tried to rescue a person in a flooded railway station

The regional authorities in the southern state of Baden-Wuerttemberg put the number of injured in the flooding at below 10.

Violent storms and torrential rain on Sunday evening and during the night caused severe damage in the regional state.

A number of people had to be rescued from their cars trapped in the floods.

Hailstones which fell were so severe that they not only caused extensive damage, but left main roads blocked and snow ploughs needed to be bought in to clean them away so that traffic could flow again.

A car is seen among uprooted trees and rubble on a road in Braunsbach, Germany, where two streams burst their banks after heavy rain

Devastated: Firefighters walk over piles of rubble after flash flooding Braunsbach, southern Germany

A digger removes debris from a road in Braunsbach, Germany after two streams burst their banks after heavy rain

A woman walks through muddy water in a residential area in Braunsbach after heavy storms and severe weather hit parts of Germany

The German news agency DPA said that a river broke its banks in Braunsbach, destroying one house and damaging several others.

Eyewitnesses posted videos on social network sites showing cars being carried away by the floods and crashing into shop windows.

The head of one rural district in Schwaebisch Hall, Michael Knaus, said that more rain fell in the space of a few hours than normally falls over several months.

The Baden-Wuerttemberg authorities said that as many as 7,000 firefighters, police officers and rescue workers were called out in some 2,200 incidents.

German luxury carmaker Audi has also stopped production at its second-biggest plant in southwestern Germany because of flooding.

Parts of the factory, where over 16,000 people build Audi's high-margin models such as the A8 saloon and the R8 sports car, have been flooded following heavy rains over night, a spokeswoman said on Monday.

Firefighters climb over rubble in Braunsbach, southwestern Germany. Authorities said at least four people have died in the storm

A firefighter walks on a flooded road in Braunsbach, Germany, where a river broke its banks, destroying one house and damaging others

An overturned car is seen among rubble and debris on a road in Braunsbach, Germany. The Baden-Wuerttemberg authorities said that as many as 7,000 firefighters, police officers and rescue workers were called out in some 2,200 incidents

The spokeswoman couldn't say when production would resume or how many workers were affected by the disruptions.

Audi is due to report first-quarter results on Wednesday after delaying publication due to VW's diesel emissions scandal.

Over the weekend, a man in his 40s was killed by a lightning bolt when he was climbing down a mountain in southern Poland.

A lightning strike also left eight children and three adults injured at a birthday party in a Paris park when the group sought shelter under a tree.