Swiss downpour brings floods and landslides

PERLEN, Switzerland - Torrential rain has lashed Switzerland non-stop for nearly three days, unleashing landslides and floods which have cut off villages in central Switzerland and killed two firefighters.

Flooding stretches from the Bernese Alps in central Switzerland to the city of St Gallen in the northeast, as rivers burst their banks and lakes overflow.

Two fire-fighters were killed in a landslide during the night in Entlebuch in the canton (state) of Lucerne, Swiss television said on Monday, adding the region remained cut off after roads and rail tracks were flooded.

Bridges threatened to collapse under the force of the floodwaters and part of a major highway connecting Lucerne and Zug was closed as water came close to submerging the road.

Lucerne police said in a statement there had been several landslides in the Entlebuch area, while the rivers Reuss and Emme had burst their banks.

"It was critical at 4am (2pm NZT) this morning and it could get bad again tonight as the water level is still rising," firefighter Armin Koch told Reuters in Perlen.

Rain continued to fall on Monday as bulldozers cleared mud from the streets and fire-fighters pumped water from flooded cellars in towns across central and eastern Switzerland.

In a mountainous country dependent on public transport, Swiss railways advised against travelling in central Switzerland and said numerous train links, including between the capital Berne and the city of Lucerne, had been cut.

While parched Portugal battles forest fires, weather forecasts said the rain in Switzerland was set to continue until late Monday.

In neighbouring Austria, heavy rains in the Alps caused land slides that damaged dozens of houses and killed one woman on Sunday in the southern province of Styria.

The 50-year-old woman was buried by a mass of mud and rocks that crashed into her house in the village of Gasen, where another 15 houses were evacuated due to the danger of steep hill sides collapsing, emergency officials said.

- REUTERS