Interview. Cyclone Chido. The operations director of Cherbourg airport to support that of Mayotte

THE airports of Cherbourg-Manche and Mayotte-Marcel-Henry have one thing in common: they are both operated by the Edeis group. Like his colleague Romuald Gaspard, Julien Alcacer was part of the internal reinforcements sent on site after the passage of Cyclone Chido on the island department on December 14, 2024.

Several replacements from Edeis came as reinforcements to the Mayotte airport. What was your role?

Four waves of reinforcements indeed came on the mission. As far as I am concerned, I was part of the second wave with other colleagues from Tours, Reims and Saint-Martin airports. The latter had already experienced a similar situation in 2017 after the passage of Irma. We were relieved by colleagues from Nîmes, Dole and Dijon. Currently, it is the 4^e relief who is on site. My mission mainly consisted of being able to ensure fire safety at the airport to allow the air bridge quickly set up by the State to operate between Mayotte and Reunion. Our employees are there to reinforce the airport fire brigade teams which are already present, and at the same time to come and help clear the infrastructure.

Did you already know the Mayotte-Marcel-Henry airport?

Yes, I had already been there on mission in 2020. Edeis has 18 airports in mainland France and overseas. As soon as there is a need for reinforcements, we call on employees on a voluntary basis. This time, I found an airport which, in itself, had not really changed, apart from a few buildings, on airport infrastructures marked by the passage of the cyclone. The most striking thing was what we saw around us. The surroundings and the town were unrecognizable. This immediately gives you an overview of the situation when you arrive on site. I stayed ten days, I spent New Year's Eve there. On January 1, there was still the airlift and we saw the resumption of commercial flights. They were then temporarily suspended during the passage of tropical storm Dikeledi a few days ago. Today, military activity continues and commercial activity is taking place as normal, with a slightly greater frequency of flights. And fortunately, there were no personnel casualties.

What are the points of vulnerability in the event of a storm?

The Mayotte terminal has a particularity: it is architecturally designed to withstand these types of storms. The building did not suffer major damage. They are rather located around, on storage sheds, materials on the ground, anything that can be subjected to constraints. Another particularity is that the track is located at the edge of the lagoon. The winds brought a lot of trash to the parking lot and onto the track. The first mission was therefore to quickly clean it to accommodate the first flights of the airlift. On the other hand, the control tower located next to it was older. She suffered Chido's passage head-on. The armed services brought in a mobile lookout which arrived on board an Airbus A400M from the Air Force. It was also the first time that this system was deployed outside of exercise periods. The mobile lookout is still in place today and the tower is a priority subject.

Follow all the news from your favorite cities and media by subscribing to Mon Actu.