This apocalypse-like storm took place on the night of October 15 to 16, 1987. Its violence and the extent of the damage literally traumatized the inhabitants of the north-west of France.
When it arrived on the coast, the wind blew up to:
- 220 km/h on Pointe du Raz (Finistère)
- 216 km/h at Granville (Manche)
- 200 km/h in Penmarc’h and Ouessant (Finistère)
- 187 km/h in Quimper (Finistère)
These already incredible records are, perhaps, not even the highest values: weather stations and their anemometers were damaged by the winds and it is possible that they blew even stronger! The maximum recorded wind gusts are consistent with a Category 3 to 4 hurricane.
Television archive from 1987. © France 3 Bretagne
A “weather bomb” with bombardment-like damage
However, it was not a real hurricane, nor even a former hurricane, but an explosive storm. A depression deepened very strongly due to a contrastcontrast enormous temperature between fairly warm waters and a masse d’airmasse d’air very cold. This depression suddenly accelerated as it passed under the jet stream. There pressionpression then fell to 948 hPa, a record for France: this is what the meteorologistsmeteorologists call it a “weather bomb”.
At that time, alerts weather reportweather report did not exist and many residents were surprised. When they woke up on October 16, they described scenes worthy of a bombing. “The 1987 hurricane” caused 15 deaths in France (19 in England) and 6.7 billion euros in damage. A quarter of Brittany’s forests have been destroyed. Météo France estimates that such a phenomenon occurs on average once every 100 years.
