In Corbières, the Cascatel cooperative cellar was crossed by the raging river. Thanks to a huge collective effort, a new cellar was rebuilt within a year. Crossed views of the two presidents, the former and the current.
In the Cascastel cooperative cellar, the water rose to more than 3 meters, pulverizing vats, bottling line, refrigeration unit and heavy machinery. The road connecting the cellar via Villeneuve (commune also affected) was destroyed. The town of Castastel found itself isolated, following the collapse of bridges and roads. In Tuchan, around a hundred hectares of vines were affected by the floods, a total of 250 hectares in the territory of the Corbières appellation were wiped out. Further down, Portel suffered, notably with its entire water treatment system washed away by the Berre.
It was apocalyptic!
In the Orbieu Valley, Cascastel-des-Corbières is cut off from the world. It took 48 hours for first aid to arrive in the village. The inhabitants were deprived of toilets, the evacuation systems having been washed away…. Max Saury, the current president of the cellar, remembers this “huge night”.
Independent – CHRISTOPHE BARREAU
“The raging water burst through the wall upstream and passed through the cellar. Everything was swept away by the flow, then found itself buried under 2 meters of silt.” If the concrete tanks withstood the shock, the access doors to the tanks were torn off. “We lost all the winemaking equipment: pumps, filters, the entire bottling line is gone, fiber cement vats were taken away. And we suffered the loss of all the dry materials: glasses, cardboard, labels, corks. Entire pallets of bottles left with the torrent. 5,500 hectoliters of bulk, 100,000 bottles, 90 barrels were swallowed by the waves… It was apocalyptic! remembers Max Saury, the current president. “A large tractor for spreading effluent from the cellar was swept away by the flood and found 20 km further down, at the Château de Gléon!”
The Independent – Archives
“The vineyard suffered enormously, it took us 2 years to put everything back in place, everything was gutted. The winegrowers were able to benefit from the natural disaster decree and the State region and Department financed a large part in addition to the insurance. has been endless files My vines and those of. my parents suffered. I had a rental house on the river. My tenants climbed onto the roof during the night and in the early morning, boards were installed between the roofs to evacuate them from one house to another. A new cellar was rebuilt in the 2000s. The old cellar was rehabilitated. With the AMA group, we estimated 1 billion francs at the time.
Solidarity touched us a lot
At the time, Christian Marty was the president of the cellar. He will never forget these images engraved in his memory: “Cascastel was cut off from the world, the cellar was smashed. Horrible! The legionnaires were there, housed in the home. They were effective… They were in the mud up to my neck! Among the images that come back to me, I see again the helicopter hoisting the tanks. What enormous losses! It was discouraging. And yet, we all rolled up our sleeves so as not to sink under the immensity of the task, and we worked hard to rebuild the new cellar. And the miracle happened: the next harvest was brought into the new structure!”
Also read:
Deadly floods of November 1999: hour by hour, the story of the real hell experienced in Aude 25 years ago
The vineyard was partly rebuilt with plantings of Syrah and Grenache Noir. “Despite the bad memories, we experienced intense, very warm moments, with people who became friends. The solidarity warmed our hearts.”
