Storm Ciarán brings record rainfall to Italy as European death toll rises to 14
In France, hundreds of thousands of people are still without electricity in their homes as the storm rages on.
Record-breaking rain produced floods in a vast swath of Italy’s Tuscany region as Storm Ciarán pushed into the country overnight, trapping residents in their homes, inundating hospitals and overturning cars.
At least six people in Italy and one person in Albania have been killed, bringing the storm’s death toll to 14 across Europe this week.
In Albania, police said a motorist died when he lost control while driving a car, which slid and hit barriers. Many roads in the country were flooded, including in the capital, Tirana.
Huge waves pummelling the Adriatic shores of the Balkans, and strong winds uprooted trees and ripped off roofs. Ferries connecting Croatia’s islands with the coastline were halted.
Italian Civil Protection authorities said that 200 millimetres (nearly eight inches) of rain fell in a three-hour period, from the coastal city of Livorno to the inland valley of Mugello, and caused riverbanks to overflow. Video showed at least a dozen cars getting swept away down a flooded road.
Tuscany Governor Eugenio Giani said that six people died in the storm, which dumped an amount of rainfall not recorded in the last 100 years.
In France, some 260,000 homes were still without electricity on Saturday morning, mainly in Brittany and Normandy, after the passage of storm Ciaran, electricity company Enedis reported.
“At 8 a.m., 260,000 customers remain to be replenished, particularly in Brittany (200,000) and Normandy (51,000),” the company said in a press release.
More than 1.2 million households have been affected by the storm, with electricity restored to 875,000 homes late on Friday.
Storm Ciaran claimed the lives of at least two people in France and left damage that will take several days to resolve.
Emmanuel Macron, who visited Finistère on Friday, the most affected region, called on the French to “remain extremely vigilant” in the coming days.
“We have a fight, which is to restore normal life as quickly as possible,” the President added, aiming in particular to restore electricity to 90% of affected households by Monday.
Météo-France will place 10 new departments on orange alert on Saturday evening as Storm Domingos approaches, which will cause “violent gusts of wind” on the Atlantic coast, meteorologists said.
Climate scientists say human-induced climate change has led to heavier rainfall during storms like Ciarán, often resulting in more severe damage.
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