A month of rain in two hours: images of brutal floods in Marseille

From 6 a.m. this Tuesday, torrential rain fell on Marseille. In the images from the TF1 1 p.m. news report above, we see passers-by with water up to their knees, impossible to make their way on foot. In 2 hours, a total of 76 millimeters of water fell in the Marseille city, as if crossed by rivers.

“We still had almost a month of precipitation in just two hours, so that’s still a lot, even for a city like Marseille which is used to it.explains Paul Marquis, meteorologist at E-Meteo Service. One month is too much water at once, we can’t get all this water out.“

“Look, everyone is honking, everyone is panicked”

At daybreak, motorists surprised by the water noted the extent of the phenomenon. “This is war. Really, it’s war“, testifies a man filming cars and trucks completely drowned. The rains were so heavy that the road did not resist. Almost everywhere in the city, these bad weather caused traffic jams, with a total of 35 kilometers of traffic jams. “We had to be patient.”It’s a quagmire. It’s incredible. Look, everyone is honking, everyone is panicked“, says a man in front of our camera.

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The Old Port was not spared either. Even at the end of the morning, the district remained covered in water, forcing traders to clean up with the means at hand. Still damage to be assessed, a certain weariness is setting in while the city had already faced torrential rains and floods in early September (see the article linked above). “When it rains here in Marseille, we are always flooded… We have a lot of goods in reserve that we have lost” laments a trader.

The water should clear in the coming hours, with the return of milder weather. Due to bad weather, 32 schools remained closed this Tuesday morning in Marseille. Most of them were expected to reopen in the afternoon.