11 months after the first episode of flooding which affected Pas-de-Calais, in November 2023, a new monitoring committee was held this Monday afternoon at the prefecture in Arras. The new Minister of Ecological Transition, and elected from the territory since July and her victory in the legislative elections, Agnès Pannier-Runacher chaired this meeting which brought together local elected officials and water stakeholders (Water Agency, VNF, management unions, etc.). The minister first took stock of the various projects:
- 500 emergency works carried out
- 174 structuring works identified
- 260 million euros mobilized by the State to support, compensate, rehouse and secure residents and territories
Unheard of for flood risk in the department
First observation: the risk of flooding remains very high. The level of the water tables is very high, the soils are waterlogged, which was not the case at the end of the summer of 2023. Despite this, Agnès Pannier-Runacher wants to show the mobilization of the State to avoid a new disaster: “we have done in one year what we have never done in this region to improve resilience”. Each participant in the meeting left with a very clear roadmap to report any problems in the coming month: “It could be companies that do not have enough manpower to carry out work. We want the inhabitants of the territory who are threatened to be able to obtain cofferdams, 100% covered by the State, this which is new”.
Pumps rented for the winter
The State is also providing the means to equip itself with giga-pumps. Devices came from the Paris region and the South of France last year, thanks to Civil Security, but also from the Netherlands as part of the European solidarity mechanism. For this winter, these devices will already be in the department.
Stéphane Barbereau
Sdis 62 (Pas-de-Calais departmental fire and rescue service) will be equipped with 4 giga-pumps: “for their manufacture, it takes a time which is still too long, they will be there in 2025, explains Jean-Claure Leroy, the president (PS) of the department. We are therefore going to rent pumps to reassure the population.” It is the State which will pay the rental. He will also rent pumps to position them this winter at the Cuinchy lock, in Béthunois and at the square lock, at Hames-Boucres, in Calaisis. Here too, awaiting the manufacture of definitive pumps.
