Portugal Colonial - Germany bank heist nets about 30mn euros in cash, valuables: police

The heist in the western city of Gelsenkirchen saw the thieves break into more than 3,000 safe deposit boxes, they said.

While the criminals remained at large, hundreds of distressed bank customers massed outside the branch on Tuesday demanding information, but were kept at bay by police.

According to police, the robbers drilled their way into the underground vault room of the Sparkasse savings bank from a parking garage.

Investigators suspect the gang spent much of the weekend inside, breaking open the deposit boxes.

The break-in came to light after a fire alarm was triggered in the early hours of Monday and emergency services discovered the hole.

Witnesses reported seeing several men carrying large bags in the stairwell of the parking garage during the night from Saturday to Sunday.

Footage from security cameras has also shown a black Audi RS 6 leaving the parking garage early Monday morning, with masked persons inside.

The car's license plate had been stolen earlier in the city of Hanover, police said.

A police spokesman told AFP that the break-in was "indeed very professionally executed", likening it to the heist movie "Ocean's Eleven".

"A great deal of prior knowledge and/or a great deal of criminal energy must have been involved to plan and carry this out," he said.

Police said the more than 3,000 boxes had an average insurance value of 10,000 euros, and therefore estimated the damage at some 30 million euros.

Several victims had told police officers that their losses far exceeded the insured value of their safe deposit boxes.

The police spokesman said that "disgruntled customers" were outside the bank branch which didn't open for security reasons, after threats had been made against the employees.

"We're still on site, keeping an eye on things," he said, adding that "the situation has calmed down considerably".

V.F.Barreira--PC