An elderly blackberry picker caused rail chaos in Germany after sparking a suicide alert.

Police said eye-witnesses thought the 70-year-old man criss-crossing the tracks near Cologne was planning to commit suicide.

When they located the man they discovered he'd been looking for blackberries.

As a result of his actions, 11 trains were delayed for a total of four hours and a section of track between Cologne and Aachen was shut down completely for 40 minutes.

The man now faces a fine.