France Struggles to Dry Out From Flash Flooding

Central and southern France were recovering on Friday from flooding that lashed the areas on Thursday, after heavy rainfall and swollen rivers unleashed torrents of muddy water that cut off roads, swept away cars and swamped buildings.

The French authorities have not linked any deaths or injuries directly to the floods, which were slowly receding on Friday as towns mopped mud and water out of homes, hauled away overturned cars and cleared out tangles of tree branches and debris. But the sudden downpours — the worst in more than four decades in some areas — caught the country by surprise.

Firefighters wade through floodwaters on Thursday in Givors, a town in the Rhône department. More than 3,000 firefighters have been deployed to help, the government said on Friday.

Some of the heaviest downpours were in the Ardèche department, which was battered by more than two feet of rain in 48 hours. Flash flooding swamped several towns, including Saint-Marcel-lès-Annonay, southwest of Lyon, where raging waters lifted a car away.

Rushing floodwaters also trapped vehicles in Labégude, another town in the Ardèche area, where Thursday’s rainfall “was the most intense ever recorded over two days since the beginning of the 20th century,” according to the national weather forecaster.

In Annonay, the largest town in the Ardèche, witnesses told local media that a “mini tsunami” surged through the town within minutes. Schools were evacuated and remained closed on Friday.

Workers pump water from a road in Givors. A section of a nearby highway was still closed on Friday after flooding submerged it.

Residents were taken aback by the sudden deluge, which gave them little time to waterproof their homes and businesses, like at this store in Bayonne, in southwestern France.

More than 40 people were trapped for several hours in a supermarket on Thursday in Givors after water rushed into the store. They were safely evacuated.

While the flooding was mostly receding on Friday, several areas of the country were still on the second-highest level of alert for flooding and rain — including in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques, on the border with Spain, where the Nive River in Bayonne burst through its banks in several areas.

Residents removed muddy furniture from a business in Annonay on Friday. France’s environment minister said that the authorities would declare a state of emergency tied to the natural disaster, to speed insurance payouts.

A storefront in Givors was destroyed by the surging waters. “With climate change, we must prepare to face risks and catastrophes in all fields, increasingly often,” Prime Minister Michel Barnier told reporters at a crisis monitoring center in Paris.

The flooding washed debris onto streets, interrupted some train traffic and left thousands of residents without electricity. In addition to the damage in the Ardèche. pictured here, and in the Rhône, the worst-hit areas included the Loire, Haute-Loire, Lozère, and Alpes-Maritimes departments.

The cleanup in Annonay on Friday. Nearly 1,000 people were evacuated in affected areas of France, including some who were stranded and had to be pulled to safety by helicopters, the government said.

A woman salvages shoes that washed up a day after severe flooding in Givors.

Thursday was the third-rainiest October day on record in France, according to the national weather service. The ground in some areas was already saturated with water from prior rain and more precipitation was expected in the coming days.

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