Perched on a bridge overlooking the Saint-Martin district in Rennes (Ille-et-Vilaine), Nadine Kerléan leans over to observe the water surging below, this Sunday, January 26. The sixty-year-old has no “never seen that”. The towpaths that border the canal have disappeared. The football goals on the neighboring sports fields are submerged up to the crossbar.
During the night from Saturday to Sunday, some 400 residents living in surrounding streets and alleys were evacuated. Water has since infiltrated the ground floor of some homes. The dikes and retention basins built during the renovation of this district during the 2010s were not enough to prevent flooding, but undoubtedly helped to avoid the worst.
-Rennes had not experienced such floods since 1981, according to the town hall, which activated its municipal protection plan like ten other towns in the conurbation. Crossed by two rivers, the Ille and the Vilaine, the Breton capital is suffering the repercussions of weeks of rain. At the beginning of January, several rivers in the department had already burst their banks. Waterlogged, the soils were unable to absorb what the storms Éowyn, Friday 24, then Herminia, the next day, dumped.
You have 73.14% of this article left to read. The rest is reserved for subscribers.
