The return of rain swelled the watercourses again on Monday November 20 in Pas-de-Calais, which suffered repeated flooding for two weeks. The department returned to orange on Monday for flooding, Vigicrues thus affirms that “the precipitation on Monday caused the level of waterways to rise again”, with the risk of new “damaging overflows”.
The Minister of the Economy, Bruno Le Maire, announced Monday that the rehousing costs of “several thousand” of affected victims would be “the responsibility of the State and insurers” for six months, from the end of november. This support will apply “retroactively in order to cover the flooding of recent days”, specifies Bercy.
Bruno Le Maire, who called on insurers not to “nitpick”, also promised that all insurance assessments would be carried out by December 4, for individuals and businesses; he recalled that the latter will be able to “benefit from partial activity” and “from deferral of social or tax charges”.
“The modification of the law on natural disasters” allowing this support will be brought forward to “the end of November”, affirmed the minister in Saint-Omer, after a discussion with local actors and representatives of the insurance sector. The floods, which have left five people injured since November 6, have affected 6,000 homes, 160 businesses, 130 businesses and 53 farms according to the prefecture.
New pumps installed to facilitate water evacuation
The department voted on Monday for aid, provided with the assistance of the region, of 380 euros per household aimed at covering the insurance deductible for residents of municipalities classified for natural disasters.
After two weeks of record rainfall leading to a series of historic floods, the lull over the weekend triggered a decline and allowed the Red Cross to close its emergency accommodation centers. If Monday’s rainy episode is “not at all exceptional”, according to Météo-France, the soils still saturated with water make the watercourses very sensitive to accumulations.
“Damaging overflows” – but of lesser importance than those of the last two weeks – are envisaged from the end of Monday evening, in particular on the Hem and the Aa then on the Canche, three of the six rivers in orange vigilance, Vigicrues told Agence-France Presse.
To facilitate the evacuation of water towards the sea, two Dutch pumps with a capacity of 5,000 cubic meters per hour (m3/h) are being installed near Dunkirk (North), reported the Hauts prefecture -de-France on
In total, 181 municipalities in Pas-de-Calais and 24 in the North have already been recognized as sites of natural disaster. A new natural disaster recognition meeting is planned for this week.