Savoie: one year after the torrential flood in Notre-Dame-de-Briançon, “the trauma is still there”

One year after the torrential flood in Notre-Dame-de-Briançon in Tarentaise, the scars of the floods are still there. And as soon as heavy rains are forecast, the former victims begin to worry again. On the night of November 14 to 15, 2023, the waters of the Fougère were unleashed, a huge flow of mud and rocks invaded the heart of the village and in particular the rue des acacias. Around a hundred homes were affected.

“At night, we have the anxieties that come back”

A year ago, Catherine and her husband had their feet in the mud, they confided in France Bleu Pays de Savoie: “we still have more than two meters of silt. Where we are, monstrous quantities of rubble have been removed“, they lamented at the time. Today, the Fern torrent below Catherine's house is completely calm, as if she had had a nightmare. And yet, the trauma is there. “At night, we have anxiety and thoughts that come back. We haven't forgotten and it's still difficult a year later. We were able to move back into the house, but as you can see, the kitchen floor needs to be redone. We had 1.90m of water and the stairs leading to the cellar were completely destroyed.“, says Catherine.

The traces of the torrential flood a year ago are still there, explains this resident of Notre-Dame-de-Briançon. “Moreover, even in our village, we still see the wounds in the gardens which are no longer there, there are destroyed walls, torn gates still placed on the ground. Everything is not repaired and we will have more months and years to come“.

On the alert as soon as it starts to rain

And as soon as it rains, all the former victims of rue des Acacias are on alert. Like Isabelle who had to leave her home for seven months. “We remain traumatized, especially since we had spent the night at home, so we saw the water gradually rising. And today, every time it rains, like at the end of September – beginning of October, the torrent rises again, and the anxiety comes again. We start getting up at 6 a.m. again to move the cars. Everything that also happens in Spain in Valencia makes us relive what we experienced“.

Victims like Gérard, his 73-year-old neighbor. He has had a lot of trouble sleeping since that night. “I wake up all the time at 3:30 in the morning, I can't get over it. It's very, very hard.“The wounds are still raw. Isabelle can't stop the tears from flowing when she talks about her house.”At the beginning, during the disaster, I said to myself, let's take our suitcases and leave. But we still have our life here, it's our house, so it's our cocoon, it's the family cocoon.” Just like Catherine, who does not want to give up, even if her house borders the torrent. “We've been here for 47 years. We love our house and it would be heartbreaking to have to leave. When the torrent is in flood, we hear the rocks hitting the house“.

More than two million jobs

All these former victims live with the fear that it will start again. The mayor of La Léchère, Dominique Colliard, tries to reassure them, even if there is one thing he cannot control, and that is the unleashing of the elements. “Today, a year later, memories come back, images come to mind. It’s a hamlet that was devastated, surrounded by water and people who were in disarray. I have in mind a person who stayed 12 hours on a chair with water ten centimeters from his feet“, also experienced.

“What has been done since then has been to clean up, to remove the scars of these floods, and today to secure the Fougère watercourse. There was work to strengthen the stream bed following the damage and the flood which had washed away part of the banks. If we take two million works, it will take at least five to six years to be able to finance all of the renovation work, with priority given to access to the heart of the village, including Notre-Dame-de-Briançon. It is one of the priorities.”concludes the mayor. Studies are underway to secure the valley's waterways.