More than 70,000 firefighters and 11,000 soldiers are on duty fighting the most dramatic floods in Germany in more than a decade. Thousands of residents were still unable to return to their homes, and bridges and streets were impassable in many regions of eastern and southern Germany.

German news agency dpa said people in Magdeburg in Saxony-Anhalt were anxiously awaiting the crest of the Danube river today, while residents further upstream were starting to clean up the debris that was left along Europe's biggest river.

High water levels were still reported from Hungary, Slovakia, while thousands of people in Austria were busy shoveling away the mud left by the receding floodwaters.

Twenty people reportedly have died in the floods.

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