1 dead, 1 missing in Europe floods

Storms caused severe flooding across parts of western and central Europe, with a firefighter drowning Wednesday during rescue work in Germany and a man missing after he was swept away by a raging stream elsewhere in the country.

The firefighter died in the western German town of Altena, police told German news agency dpa. In the eastern town of Joehstadt, firefighters were searching for a man who had been trying to secure his property from rising waters when he disappeared.

Hof county in Bavaria issued a disaster alert late Tuesday as basements filled with water, trees were uprooted and some areas lost power overnight. In the the neighboring Czech Republic, firefighters received 800 calls about incidents ranging from fallen trees to flooded basements. A highway linking the capital, Prague, to the east of the country partly flooded overnight. Thousands of households remained without electricity Wednesday.