45 killed as violent storm hits western Europe

A VIOLENT storm with fierce rain and hurricane- force winds battered France, Spain and Portugal yesterday, leaving at least 45 people dead.

Many of the 40 victims in France drowned, while others died when hit by parts of buildings or trees and branches that were ripped off by the wind. At least a dozen people were missing and 59 others were injured.

The storm, named Xynthia, was the worst in France since 1999 when 90 people died.

Nearly 900,000 people in France were without electricity. Rivers overflowed their banks in Brittany, and the threat of avalanches was high in the Pyrenees and the southern Alps due to wind and wet snow.

In Paris, winds knocked over motorcycles and spewed garbage around the streets of the capital. Flights were delayed and some were cancelled at the two main Paris airports. A number of trains in western France were delayed due to flooded tracks.

Winds reached about 200kmph on the summits of the Pyrenees and up to nearly 160kmph along the Atlantic Coast. The storm hit the Vendee and Charente-Maritime regions in south-western France hardest.

The storm was moving eastward and parts of France along the border with Germany and Belgium were on alert for heavy rain and high winds.

In neighbouring Spain, the Interior Minister said three people were killed by hurricane-strength winds and heavy rainfall that lashed the country’s northern regions over the weekend.

Alfredo Pérez Rubalcaba said the storm had been intense in certain regions and had caused the deaths of a woman in north-western Ourense and of two people whose car was hit by a falling tree in Arlanzon just north of Madrid.

The national weather agency had warned that a violent cyclone had formed over the Atlantic Ocean and was to cross areas bordering the Bay of Biscay.

Winds gusting up to 190kmph had blown over the Canary Islands over- night on Friday causing a crane to collapse on a building, lampposts to fall onto parked cars and forcing flight cancellations.

Portugal’s home affairs minister Rui Pereira said a child had been killed on Saturday by a falling tree in Paredes.

The 10-year-old had been playing ball near a church while waiting to go to a prayer meeting when a branch crushed him, Pereira said.