French flash floods kill at least 11

Muddy rivers and streams swollen by torrential rains tore through south-western France on Monday, swamping towns, cutting off roads and killing at least 11 people, according to French officials.

Most of the flooding occurred in the Aude region, named after the river that runs through it, after several months’ worth of rain fell within hours overnight — nearly 14 inches in some places, according to the Interior Ministry.

In Trèbes, near the city of Carcassonne, the official agency that tracks flooding nationwide described the rise in the water level — over 20 feet — as “exceptional,” and said it had nearly reached the record set in 1891. At least six people were killed there, the Interior Ministry said.

Five other people were killed in nearby towns, including a nun who was swept away by the rising waters in Villardonnel, north of Carcassonne. Eight people in the region were injured, and one was reported missing, according to a statement from the Aude prefecture, the local state authority.

In Villegailhenc, video posted by witnesses on social media showed river waters rushing through a gap where a bridge had crumbled and been carried away.

One of the witnesses was Inès Siguet, a 17-year-old high school student. In a telephone interview from her home, which was spared because it is located high up in the village, Siguet said she realised how quickly the waters had risen when she set out around 6 am to take her bus to Carcassonne.

Classes were cancelled Monday, and her school will remain closed Tuesday.

“I went back home and I changed clothes to help other inhabitants, to evacuate water, to clean up, to bring furniture upstairs,” she said, calling the experience “shocking” because no one was expecting such violent floods.

“You try to help people to save what can be saved, but there isn’t much you can do,” she said. “One resident cried in my arms because he had just finished work on his house and it was totally ruined.”

The episode was similar to flash floods last week on the Spanish island of Majorca, where 12 people died.

Frédéric de Lanouvelle, the French Interior Ministry spokesman, said the casualty count in Aude “unfortunately probably isn’t definitive.”

“There are many homes that are flooded, many people who might be isolated,” de Lanouvelle told the BFM TV news channel.

Local authorities, warning that more flooding was expected late into Monday, urged residents to stay inside and to avoid traveling. Over 10,000 homes in the Aude and neighboring Hérault area lost power, many schools were closed and public transportation ground to a halt.

Drone and helicopter video broadcast on French television showed flooded fields, houses surrounded by murky brown water, and cars overturned or abandoned on inundated roads.

After meeting with emergency services and local residents in the area, Prime Minister Édouard Philippe, who is also the acting Interior minister, told reporters Monday afternoon that some houses had suffered “very heavy” material damage and that many of the flooding victims he had met were scared.

“They see their business, their home, their means of getting to work carried away by the flood,” Philippe said.

The government, he said, will move quickly to declare the floods a natural catastrophe, a step that helps victims file insurance claims.

The Élysée Palace said that a Cabinet reshuffle that has been in the works for over a week would not be announced Monday, and that President Emmanuel Macron would head to the Aude region “as soon as possible.”

Hundreds of fire-fighters, emergency workers and police officers were deployed across the area, sometimes using helicopters to lift residents off the roofs of their flooded homes. In the village of Pezens, about 1,000 residents were evacuated because of the risk that a nearby dam would overflow.

Flash flooding in the region is not uncommon in the fall, when warm air masses from the south cross over the Mediterranean and encounter the cooler south-western tip of the Massif Central mountains, creating instability that can lead to exceptional rainfall and violent thunderstorms.

© 2018 New York Times News Service