Furious Blizzard Stalls Travelers, Closes Factories In Scandinavia
The worst November blizzard in memory clobbered Scandinavia on Friday, shutting factories, grounding airplanes and stalling an ambulance while a woman gave birth inside.
At least one person, a 60-year-old man, was found dead under a snowdrift. Three people were killed in an auto accident in southern Sweden, the national news agency TT reported.
Two retirees were missing in northern Denmark, and police who found their abandoned car fear the couple was lost in the blizzard, Danish television said.
Skies were white with blowing snow most of the day in Denmark and southwestern Sweden, where the storm was concentrated. Mountainous waves halted passenger ship traffic in the Baltic Sea.
Scandinavian Airlines said it canceled two-thirds of its flights and more than half its Scandinavian routes. Up to 15 inches of snow was reported in southern Sweden.
“Not only do we have snow, but thunder also,” said Stig Andersson at the closed Goteborg airport in western Sweden. “It causes important technical instruments to be knocked out or distorted.”
Cars and trucks, including emergency vehicles, were stranded or crashed in both countries. Highways were closed as tow trucks and snowplows went to work. An unknown number of people reportedly spent the night stuck in cars in western Sweden after being forced off the highway by blinding snow.
Several trains were stopped in their tracks by power outages in Sweden.
One ambulance in southwestern Sweden was delayed by snow-clogged roads while its passenger, Linda Johansson, was in labor, TT reported.
“Just as we passed Furusjo my daughter was born, and everything came out well,” father Pierre Johansson said.
Baby Klara was doing fine, but her father told TT he was “a little stressed.”