“The breakers should pay”: since the end of the 1980s, Joëlle and Gaston Pirih, retirees from Rosbruck (Moselle), on the German border, have lived in a house that is leaning and where new cracks appear regularly, a consequence of the end mining activity in the region.
Strings to hold the doors and prevent them from slamming, a shutter in the living room that no longer opens, wedges under the furniture to keep them upright... The couple's daily life has been punctuated, for more than 30 years, by “repairs” in a house with a 3% slope.
The village seems pleasant at first glance.
The Pirihs, who lived in an HLM in the past, invested “all (their) savings” to build their house in a peaceful subdivision in 1978.
But Rosbruck “was sacrificed by the cessation of traditional backfilling of mining galleries from 1985”, regrets the couple, who made it their fight.
In the months that followed, “we felt tremors”.
More than a thousand in total since then.
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In the dining room, documents cover an entire section of the wall: letters from the authorities, mining plans or press clippings.
Joëlle Pirih investigates, keeps records and continues to challenge the actors so that their damage can finally be repaired.
In particular, we can see that mining galleries were exploited under a large part of the houses in Rosbruck.
But the absence of backfilling of these galleries “caused subsidence of 16 meters” of the ground.
“We get up in the morning wondering what else will happen to us,” breathes Joëlle.
Already 80 houses have been raised or destroyed in the region.
And the couple is far from being the only one to experience “an ordeal”.
In total, forty families are affected by this subsidence.
All are engaged in endless legal proceedings to have Charbonnages de France, the mining operator (represented by the State Judicial Agent after its liquidation) responsible for the damage to their homes.
In the neighboring town of Cocheren, 5 kilometers from Rosbruck, Michelle and Gérard Bertrand acquired, when the mine galleries were still backfilled, one of the oldest houses in the village.
But for three decades, it too has been leaning.
All you have to do is place a ping-pong ball on the ground to see it roll down several meters on its own to the wall.
The municipality of Rosbruck, which had also taken legal action, feels "abandoned" by the State, even though it "for 150 years" contributed to the economic development of the country, via mining, regrets its mayor, elected in 2020, Bernard Betker.
“I support the residents,” he continues, while their legal battle continues, more than 15 years after their very first appearance in court in 2007.
After several battles between experts and the request in 2015 for additional expertise by the Metz Court of Appeal, a hearing was held last November, on the basis of written conclusions, without pleadings.
Decisions must be made, on a case-by-case basis, from the first half of 2024 and spread over the entire year.
But Joëlle Pirih assures her: “All the families have not yet received their expert report” and should not obtain a legal response this year.
An eternity which also discourages Michelle and prevents the couple from building new projects.
“We are in the dark, we don’t know what will happen.”
“It seems that we want a natural solution, that people die”, as has already been the case for certain victims, concludes Joëlle.