The Guardian: Severe weather kills dozens in Europe

Fifteen homeless people killed in Warsaw alone as temperatures dip to as low as -33C in Europe and snow leads to travel chaos

Dozens of people are thought to have frozen to death as extreme conditions continued to affect many parts of Europe today.

Polish news channel TVN24 said 47 people, mainly homeless, had been found frozen to death since the start of December as temperatures dropped as low as -18C. Police in Warsaw said 15 people died on Saturday night.

Freezing temperatures and snow were causing travel chaos in many countries, including France, where 40% of flights from Charles de Gaulle and Orly airports in Paris were cancelled. In Spain, runways were closed at Madrid's Barajas airport after temperatures fell to -8C and high-speed AVE trains were suspended between the capital and Barcelona, Malagá and Seville.

Temperatures dropped to as low as -33C in southern parts of Germany where hundreds of road accidents have been blamed on the weather.

Düsseldorf International airport, Germany third busiest, was also forced to close. Airports in the Netherlands and Belgium were also affected.

"There is still heavy snowfall and every time we clear a runway to permit a flight, we have to shut it down again because of the heavy snowfall," said Jan Van der Cruysse, spokesman for Brussels National Airport.

Meanwhile, a clean-up operation was under way along the US eastern seaboard following record snowfalls in some areas at the weekend which combined with high winds to produce blizzard conditions. An entire winter's snowfall fell in Washington DC, making it the snowiest December on record, while more than half a metre of snow fell in parts of Virginia, New York, New Jersey and other eastern states.

The conditions at US airports led to flight delays to the UK with some aircraft arriving at Heathrow three hours late this morning, while at Manchester airport some passengers were still waiting to get on flights scheduled to have taken off yesterday afternoon.

Motorists were urged to stay off treacherous roads and several main arteries were closed. In Washington, drivers who ventured out often had to abandon their cars due to deep snow on the streets.

In eastern Europe, more than 220 villages and towns in Bulgaria were left without electricity, and toppled trees cut power in several mountainous suburbs in the capital Sofia.

An overflowing dam in the town of Zlatograd, south-east of the capital, Sofia, flooded the basements of several apartment buildings, the town's mayor told news agency Focus.

Some 50 passengers were injured early today when a train failed to stop and hit a buffer at the main Zagreb station, in the Croatian capital, police said. The accident involved a train travelling from the central town of Sisak to Zagreb. One person suffered a life-threatening injury, while some 40 people required medical assistance, hospital sources said.

Police said it was still unclear what caused the accident. Train travel in Croatia has been disrupted in recent days due to heavy snow and very low temperatures.

Four Serie-A soccer matches were postponed in Italy over the weekend due to the weather.

In France, the heavy snowfall was not expected to end until tonight at the earliest, according to weather bureau Meteo France. Minimum temperatures hovered close to record lows in some areas overnight, with the minimum reading in the Jura department of eastern France reaching -23C.

In Moscow, where temperatures fell to -26C last week, relatively warmer temperatures of -13C brought heavy snow falls in the Russian capital, blanketing Red Square and the Kremlin. Up to 9,000 snow ploughs were said to have been sent out to clear the capital city's streets.