One dead and widespread damage after night of storms

A 25-year-old woman was killed overnight as severe thunderstorms swept across the Netherlands on Friday night and into the early hours of Saturday.

The woman, from Joure, died when a tree fell on her car in the village of ’t Haantje near Coevorden at around 12.15am, police said. Forecasters had warned that Friday’s heat would break in storms.

The KNMI weather service issued a code orange warning for central and northern parts of the country until 2am. An NL-Alert emergency message was sent across the central Netherlands, telling people to stay indoors and to call 112 only in life-threatening situations.

The storms brought heavy lightning, hailstones around 2cm across and powerful gusts, with a peak of 113 kilometres per hour recorded in Vlissingen, according to Buienradar.

Emergency services in Flevoland, Utrecht and Twente were inundated with calls about fallen trees, damaged roofs and lightning fires. The fire service in Twente alone logged around 100 incidents, NOS reported, and houses were gutted by lightning strikes in Leek, in Groningen, and in Hilversum.

More heat and isolated storms
The heat is forecast to last into next week, and the KNMI has kept a code yellow warning in place – for thunderstorms as well as heat on Saturday, and for heat alone on Sunday and Monday.

Isolated storms remain possible on Saturday afternoon and evening, mainly in the southeast, with a stray shower or storm overnight and again on Sunday in the south and centre, though much weaker than Friday night’s, the service said.

The national heat warning, issued by the public health institute RIVM, remains in force everywhere except Groningen and Friesland, where it was lifted on Saturday.