48 hours after the passage of Eunice, which caused significant material damage in France, the north of the country faces this Sunday evening the passage of another storm called Franklin.
Again classified in orange vigilance with strong winds until Monday 1 a.m., the North, Pas-de-Calais, Somme and Seine-Maritime are hit by a “new stormy episode circulating quickly, of less intensity than the recent storm Eunice, however requiring special vigilance”, according to Météo France.
Tonight and tonight, reinforcement of the #wind as a cold front passes.
#Gusts of 100 to 120 km / h loc 130 on Hauts-de-France and Seine-Maritime, 80 to 100 km / h from the coasts of the Channel to the Paris Basin and the Grand-Est.
Stay informed ▶️https://t.co/h3so1yk2rI pic.twitter.com/HS2dWQlntt
— VigiMeteoFrance (@VigiMeteoFrance) February 20, 2022
This new storm, dubbed Franklin by the Irish meteorological service, was to be marked by the movement from west to east of a “narrow but intense band of rain”, accompanied by gusts that could “reach 100 to 120 km / h and locally exceed 130 km/h” and strong waves on the Channel coast.
The wind was expected to remain strong in the second part of the night "with coastal gusts of 90 to 110 km / h, very locally more than 120 km / h".
12,000 homes still without electricity
Franklin hits departments where trees and infrastructure are already weakened by the passage Friday afternoon of storm Eunice, accompanied by very violent gusts, even inland.
Despite the efforts of Enedis, which mobilizes "more than 1,000 technicians and partner companies", around 12,000 customers had still not been able to be supplied with electricity in Hauts-de-France at the end of the day on Sunday, out of the 170,000 affected customers at the height of the Eunice storm.
#Eunice 💨 Our teams are still mobilized in difficult conditions due to the strong winds still in progress and numerous tree falls on the electrical network.
Let's stay vigilant, a second phenomenon of strong winds is expected this evening.
#PublicService pic.twitter.com/uepGTzsjj8
— Enedis (@enedis) February 20, 2022
The technicians work in "difficult conditions", trees lying on the tracks preventing their good circulation, and the arrival Sunday evening of the new storm was to "slow down the replenishment operations in progress", while risking causing new damage to the electrical network, underlines the operator.
Trains canceled
On the rail side, TER connections were suspended on Sunday evening due to bad weather.
"Traffic will be interrupted this Sunday, February 20, from 7 p.m. on the coast (Calais, Boulogne, Dunkirk, Abbeville)", warned on its Twitter account the Hauts-de-France TER network, which had been strongly disturbed until Saturday afternoon by the damage from Eunice.
“Disruptions, deletions and delays” are also to be expected on Monday, February 21.
⚠💨 Storm Franklin
Traffic will be interrupted this Sunday, February 20, from 7 p.m. on the coast (Calais, Boulogne, Dunkirk, Abbeville).
Disruptions, deletions and delays are expected on Monday, February 21.
pic.twitter.com/D5xZhBrbVK
– TER Hauts-de-France (@TERHDF) February 20, 2022
“On several lines on the northern side of the region, security reconnaissance will be carried out tomorrow (Monday) at the very beginning of the morning by the first TER trains of the day, without passengers.
Drivers will be accompanied in some cases by logging teams,” it says.
Also in Normandy, the SNCF has planned to interrupt traffic on several of its TER lines, in particular Rouen-Le Havre, Caen-Cherbourg and Lisieux-Trouville.
“Traffic will be interrupted from 10 p.m. tonight,” SNCF said in a tweet.
Some schools, such as the Boucher de Perthes high school in Abbeville (Somme), whose roof was damaged by the passage of Eunice, will also remain closed on Monday.
