Last farewell to the Xynthia storm victims in France by Zuzana Zelenakova

Violent windstorm called Xynthia that swept across western Europe on 26-28 February killed more than fifty people in France. About seventy people were injured and some are said to be missing. Also Germany, Spain, Portugal and Belgium reported casualties, but France remains the country that was hit hardest. In France, most people died when tidal waves caused by powerful storm passed over the sea wall and flooded the coastal town of L´Aiguillion-sur-Mer, mobile home park close to the wall in particular. On Thursday, a mass took place in the cathedral of Luçon in memory of the 53 people killed by the last week´s storm. Together with hundreds of people also the ! French Prime Minister François Fillon attended the mass and gave a speech honoring the dead. Earlier this week, President Nicolas Sarkozy visited L´Aiguillon-sur-Mer to express his condolences and said "the urgent thing is to support the families who have people missing or dead." At the same time he officially gave away three million euros of emergency funds to help the victims. 9,000 rescue workers were engaged in evacuating people trapped in their houses and searching for victims. About 220,000 households remained without electricity due to the storm on Monday. For France it was the worst storm since 1999, when 92 people were killed. "It is a natural catastrophe," said French Interior Minister Brice Hortefeux. "It's obvious that if this had happened during the day, the death toll would not have been disastrous, because people were taken by surprise during their sleep." While in France most of the victims drowned, in Germany a motorist in the Black Forest, a fema! le jogger in Bergheim and a man on a walk in forest near Frank! furt wer e all killed by falling trees. It was similar in case of casualties in Spain and Portugal.

related story (sgx16676): http://www.france24.com/en/20100304-xynthia-death-toll-rises...

by Zuzana Zelenakova for SigEx Ventures (http://sigexventures.com)

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