Three French departments have been placed on red alert for "strong wind" for Thursday, November 2, with 30 others on orange alert, including most of the Paris region: An area encompassing the north-western quarter of France is bracing for the arrival of "very strong autumnal storm" Ciaran from Wednesday evening, with gusts of up to 170 km/h combined with heavy rain. The event has been described as a potential "weather bomb" by French national meteorological service Météo-France. Interior Minister Gérald Darmanin called for caution and to "scrupulously follow the prefects' instructions," in a message posted on X (formerly Twitter).
À l’approche de la #TempeteCiaran, @meteofrance rehausse ses prévisions :
— Gérald DARMANIN (@GDarmanin) November 1, 2023
???? 3 départements en vigilance rouge
???? 30 départements en vigilance orange
J’appelle tous nos concitoyens à la responsabilité, en faisant preuve d’une grande prudence et en suivant scrupuleusement les… pic.twitter.com/PJ2KQFfB9i
Truck traffic will be banned in Brittany on Thursday, Transport Minister Clément Beaune announced on Wednesday. "We have taken measures via prefectures to ban truck traffic. Many were already banned because it's a public holiday, and this will continue tomorrow, particularly throughout the Brittany region," said the Minister.
Beaune also urged drivers to observe an "absolute driving ban" in the three departments under red alert – Finistère, Côtes-d'Armor and Manche.
Interior Minister Darmanin has announced that 3,200 firefighters will be mobilized in the four départements in Brittany (Côtes-d'Armor, Ille-et-Vilaine, Finistère and Morbihan), as well as in the Manche and Loire-Atlantique departments.
For the Finistère department alone, which could be the hardest hit, more than 650 firefighters have been mobilized for Wednesday night – compared with the usual 250 – as well as more than 435 gendarmes, explained Prefect Alain Espinasse at a press briefing. In Rennes, about 435 gendarmes have also been mobilized, with the support of two helicopters from the air department for any helicopter rescue operations.
Enedis (a French electricity distributor) has also announced that it will be sending reinforcements to deal with any potential damage to electricity networks and carry out rapid repairs.
The arrival of this powerful storm has prompted SNCF, the French national railway company, to announce the suspension on Thursday of all local "TER" train lines in five regions: Brittany, Pays de la Loire, Normandie, Centre-Val de Loire and Hauts-de-France. High-speed "TGV" trains for Brittany will only run between Paris and Rennes, without going further to Brest, Quimper or Saint-Malo, said a spokesman for SNCF Bretagne. Paris-Lille connections will be maintained.
Brest Bretagne airport will be closed from Wednesday 5 pm to Thursday 9:30 am. Boat connections with the islands will be severely disrupted, if not completely suspended.
The prefect for the department in western Brittany, Alain Espinasse, issued a reminder on Tuesday of the need for extreme vigilance, asking the population to "avoid all travel after 8 pm and throughout the night," to "stay indoors until the wind dies down," to "secure or bring to shelter any object likely to constitute a projection hazard" and, finally, to avoid the coastline, the banks of waterways or wooded areas. People are also advised to bring independent lighting equipment, such as flashlights. All events likely to involve the movement of people were to be canceled, and children's play areas will be closed on Thursday morning. Traffic restrictions were also imposed.
To coordinate all rescue operations, a departmental operations center, under the authority of the prefect, is due to be activated from 5 pm Wednesday. Rear Admiral Cyril de Jaurias, the deputy maritime prefect for the Atlantic area, announced that the emergency tow vessel Abeille Bourbon was ready to provide assistance at sea, at the slightest request from regional operation centers. "All sailors were invited to take shelter in an anchorage area, as the seas were forecast to be very rough, with waves that could reach 15 meters," he explained at a press briefing on Tuesday.
In the town of Granville, in the Manche department, the mayor's office has announced a 24-hour closure of a number of high-risk sites, starting at 6 pm on Wednesday. These include sites on the seafront or dotted with trees that might not withstand the storm and fall, such as the Plat-Gousset promenade, part of the path linking the train station to the town center, and the Christian-Dior garden, all of which will be closed to the public. "We have also postponed the work shift times of certain employees who start very early in the morning, such as those in charge of urban cleaning, but otherwise people here are used to it, so we're above all appealing to their common sense," said Gilles Ménard, the mayor.
Jacques, a restaurant owner on the marina, puts the event into perspective: "I've lived here since 1977, and we've seen plenty of storms." Displaying the exterior of his establishment, he explains: "We've pulled the chairs in and wedged the tables to one side to prevent the wind from pushing against the glass walls of the terrace, but I think that'll be all. If it blows too hard, then we'll close, but we're pretty used to it."
For local fishermen, the situation looks just as familiar. "For the most part, we've brought the boats in, doubled the strength of the mooring lines and stowed away all the equipment likely to cause damage if it blows away. It's a bit like someone tidying up their deck before a really bad spell, really," said Baptiste, a 26-year-old fisherman. His colleague stressed the high tide and the risk of some moorings blowing out. "In Jersey [the Channel Island], they had to use sandbags for protection. Here, it's different, we have several walls between the water and the town and we're higher up." One of them still plans to stay overnight on his boat to intervene in the event of a problem.
Translation of an original article published in French on lemonde.fr; the publisher may only be liable for the French version.