High winds kill eight and cut power in central Europe

VIENNA/PRAGUE (Reuters) - Gale-force winds hammered Austria, Germany and the Czech Republic on Saturday, killing at least eight people, snarling transport networks and cutting power lines.

In Germany, trains were delayed by uprooted trees and an intercity express collided with a fallen tree between the cities of Cologne and Koblenz, injuring the driver.

Nearly 130 flights to or from Frankfurt airport were either cancelled or diverted, a spokesman said.

Officials said air traffic in Austria and the Czech Republic was also briefly interrupted when the storm, packing winds of between 155 kph (96 miles) and 180 kph (110 mph) lashed parts of central Europe.

The storms left a mounting death toll across the region.

Austrian media reported that four people had died as a result of the storm, three of them foreigners on holiday.

Two people died when uprooted trees smashed into their cars in Lower Austria province, near Vienna, and Tyrol province in the northwest, police and rescue services quoted by national news agency APA said. One of the two was identified as a 77-year-old German tourist.

A 69-year-old German tourist was killed by a falling tree at a Tyrol campground. The fourth, believed to be a British tourist, died when a boulder loosened by high winds struck the taxi he was riding in through a mountain valley near Salzburg.

A 72-year-old motorcyclist in Bavaria, Germany, was killed when a gust blew him into advancing traffic, police said.