Storms sweep across France
A five-year-old girl was injured in a mud slide that swept through her family’s apartment as heavy rains hammered southwestern France.
Violent storms that raged across the region were spreading to eastern France today.
The weather service advised people to stay inside during the torrential rain, and watch for falling trees. It also warned of the dangers of lightning, saying two people had been struck in the last 24 hours.
The equivalent of a month’s rainfall fell in just 24 hours in the southwestern Correze region. Local rivers burst their banks, flooding buildings and causing roads to be shut.
The five-year-old girl was covered by the mud as she lay sleeping in her parent’s apartment in Tulle. She was rescued by firefighters and taken to the hospital in a serious condition.
Sixty people living in the low-rent apartment building were evacuated.
In Malmort, 120 people were evacuated from an institute for handicapped people because of floods. Another 130 people were rescued from two buses that became stuck on flooded roads in the region.
Train lines from Paris to the southern city of Toulouse were blocked by fallen trees, mud and rocks.
The rain and rising river levels also caused flooding in other areas of southwestern France.
In the Dordogne region, around 100 people were evacuated from a camping site in Saint-Leon-sur-Vezere.
