According to the police, seven people died in a serious traffic accident in Thuringia late on Saturday afternoon. Two others, including the suspected cause of the accident, were taken to the hospital with life-threatening injuries, a spokesman for the state operations center said on Saturday evening.

A spokesman for the Bad Langensalza fire department told the German Press Agency that a third person had been injured in the accident. The rescue work continued until late in the evening, and the scene of the accident will remain closed until Sunday. An expert should then look at the scene of the accident again.

According to the information, a vehicle was on the B247 near Bad Langensalza when it got into oncoming traffic for an initially unknown reason. The driver then collided with two oncoming vehicles. According to initial police findings, two of the vehicles caught fire and burned out completely.

As several media reported in the evening, the rescue control center had meanwhile issued danger information in the evening, according to which a toxic cloud of smoke had developed after the accident. Residents were advised to keep windows and doors closed and to turn off ventilation and air conditioning. At around 6:30 p.m., the control center gave the all-clear.

Thuringia's Prime Minister Bodo Ramelow (left) wrote in the short message service Twitter in the evening: "I mourn the dead and feel for the relatives. So much life extinguished in seconds. It remains bewildered."

Further details, such as those involved in the accident and the exact course of the accident, were not initially known.