Lightning Strikes In France And Germany Leave Children Injured

Lightning injured people at a park in Paris and a children's soccer match in Germany.
An ambulance leaves a building requisitioned to treat injured people, near the site of the accident at Parc Monceau in Paris, on May 28, 2016, after 11 people including 10 children were struck by lightning in the park
An ambulance leaves a building requisitioned to treat injured people, near the site of the accident at Parc Monceau in Paris, on May 28, 2016, after 11 people including 10 children were struck by lightning in the park
MATTHIEU ALEXANDRE via Getty Images

PARIS/FRANKFURT, May 28 (Reuters) - Lightning strikes in northern France and southwest Germany on Saturday left nine people seriously hurt, authorities said.

Eleven people were injured by a bolt of lightning in a park in Paris, six of them badly, the French interior ministry said.

Eight of those hurt were children, the ministry said in a statement. The incident occurred in the Monceau park in the northwest of the French capital.

The children, aged between seven and 14, had been attending a birthday party in the park at the time, Itele TV channel quoted officials as saying.

MATTHIEU ALEXANDRE via Getty Images

Eric Moulin, a spokesman for the French firefighting service, said the situation would have been worse if an off-duty fire officer had not been at hand to quickly provide first aid.

A lightning strike at a children's football match in Hoppstaetten in the German region of Rheinland-Pfalz on Saturday left the referee and two other adults seriously injured. Twenty-nine children were taken to hospital as a precaution.

(Reporting by Emmanuel Jarry, Maya Nikolaeva and Francesco Canepa; Editing by Andrew Roche)

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