Second death in France as cold kills over 260 in Europe

A second person has died in the cold snap that has hit France, as well as the rest of Europe, this week. Like the first victim, the 72-year-old woman was suffering from Alzheimer’s disease.

Reuters/Pascal Rossignol

The woman was found frozen to death on Friday in a private park in the southern city of Toulouse, according the Dépêche du Midi regional paper.

Like the man whose death was reported earlier Friday, she was an Alzheimer’s sufferer and was dressed only in pyjamas.

In other developments:

• Temperatures fell to -19.7°C in the Champagne regional capital, Rheims, approaching the city’s record of -21°C in 1929, and to -20.1°C in the eastern city of Mulhouse, close to its record of -22.8°C in 1956 for Mulhouse.
• Hundreds of motorists were stuck on the A25 motorway near the north-eastern city of Lille for part of the night.
• As concern of for the estimated 133,000 homeless people grows, President Nicolas Sarkozy visited an emergency shelter just outside Paris on Friday evening and local councils made more places available.
• A football match between Saint Etienne and Lorient was stopped after 10 minutes Saturday because the pitch was frozen. The score was 0-0.

Forecasters predict snow in the west of the country on Sunday and several regions, including Ile de France around Paris, are on alert for snow and ice.

The icy weather crossed the Mediterranean, killing one person in Algeria on Friday night, as the death toll in Europe reached at least 260:

• Algeria: A 17-year-old man was carried away by the current after slipping and falling into a water channel; his body had still not been recovered Saturday; rain and snow hit much of the country; many flights were cancelled.
• Ukraine: 122 have died, with temperatures hitting -30°C at night; 65,000 people have taken refuge in emergency centres, 12,000 in the last 24 hours.
• Poland: 45 have died; -27°C in the north-east.
• Montenegro: One dead; hundreds trapped in a road tunnel.
• Romania: 28 dead; hundreds of schools closed.
• Bulgaria: 16 dead, most of them villagers frozen by the roadside or in unheated homes.
• Russia: 64 dead; -50°C in Yakutia; pro- and anti-government demonstrators braved the cold in several cities.
• Latvia: 10 dead.
• Lithuania: Nine dead.
• Serbia: Seven dead.
• Czech Republic: Six dead.
• Greece: Two dead.
• Slovakia: One dead.
• Macedonia: One dead.
• Italy: Five dead; Rome paralysed by snow.
• Austria: Four dead; -28°C in the Tyrol.

>> Slideshow: Extreme cold weather hits Europe, on Boston.com