The violent wave of bad weather that hit the south of France continues. According to reports from Nice Matine, two bridges collapsed: the Maissa in Saint-Martin-Vesubie, seriously threatened by the rise in water levels during the night, and the Trois Ponts bridge, which did not resist the slide. “We will have to evacuate people living nearby,” Nice Mayor Christian Estrosi said in a post on X. “The situation got worse in less than 10 minutes,” he added. The Saint-Martin-Vesubie Bridge was a temporary bridge built after Storm Alex. It was flooded by the Vesubie, whose flow increased from 60 to 200 m2/s. Two empty buses parked nearby were swept away. But the river flow now appears to have stabilized.
In Saint Martin Vesubie the buses scheduled for evacuation are at the starting point pic.twitter.com/c21aC6lV31
-Egalliano06 (@tokai06) October 20, 2023
As a precaution, many roads were closed in the valleys and along the coast, including the southern carriageway of the Promenade des Anglais in Nice. Since the evening, between 80 and 120 mm of rain has fallen inland, with peaks of 180 mm in Saint-Martin-Vesubie and 150 mm in the Roya valley. After gusts reaching 141 km/h overnight in the Vesubie valley, the wind died down in the morning. The heaviest rain associated with Storm Aline moved towards Italy. However, levels are still a long way from the 500mm reached in some locations during Storm Alex, which on 2 October 2020 caused ten deaths, eight disappearances and extensive damage, especially in the Vesubie, Roya and Tinee valleys.
At 10:30 in the morning, firefighters recorded around thirty incidents of trees falling and roofs being ripped off. In total, a thousand firefighters and more than 530 gendarmes were mobilized to intervene quickly if necessary. Around twenty roads were blocked by landslides, falling trees and, in two cases, flooded fords. In the Tinee valley, the villages of Saint-Etienne-de-Tinee and Isola were temporarily isolated, after more than 200 preventive evacuations carried out on Thursday night in the valleys and dozens of others in campsites in areas at risk of flooding on the coast. , in the morning other residents were accompanied to temporary reception centers to face the rising waters.
Source: IL Tempo
John Cameron is a journalist at The Nation View specializing in world news and current events, particularly in international politics and diplomacy. With expertise in international relations, he covers a range of topics including conflicts, politics and economic trends.
