A car crashed into a gas station on the A5 from Darmstadt to Frankfurt and went up in flames.
According to the Darmstadt police, the driver of the car was killed.
Several gas pumps, a van and the roof of the plant caught fire.
The busy route was temporarily closed completely due to the heavy smoke in the direction of Frankfurt.
In the onset of rush hour traffic, there was a mile-long traffic jam on Monday.
This caused considerable traffic delays until the afternoon.
Meanwhile, the traffic flows past the scene of the accident.
According to the fire brigade, the initially unknown driver drove against a girder of the roof structure at high speed on Monday morning near Weiterstadt (Darmstadt-Dieburg district) at the Graefenhausen Ost service station for an unexplained cause.
Around 140 firefighters from the region fought the flames for hours.
Since there is only one hydrant at the rest area, some of the extinguishing water had to be driven to the scene of the fire by tanker truck.
"Fighting the fire in the roof area is extremely difficult," reported a spokesman for the fire brigade.
According to the fire brigade, the staff at the petrol station succeeded in activating the emergency shutdown of the petrol station in good time, thereby possibly preventing a disaster.
As the police learned, the car involved in the accident is registered in the Rhine-Main area. As far as the possible cause is concerned, according to the police, nothing can currently be ruled out: the person behind the wheel could have lost control due to a medical emergency, but it cannot be ruled out that there is suicidal intent. However, all these questions can only be clarified once the identity of the killed person has been clarified and, for example, one has been able to speak to relatives, it said.