An earthquake of magnitude 5.3 to 5.8, the strongest felt in France since the early 2000s, was felt Friday evening in much of the west of the country, causing material damage in the epicenter area.
The earthquake reached the magnitude of 5.3 according to the National Seismic Monitoring Network (Renass) and that of 5.8 according to the French Central Seismological Bureau (BCSF), which published a notice of “very strong earthquake”.
“This is one of the strongest earthquakes recorded on the metropolitan territory”, underlined the Minister of Ecological Transition and Territorial Cohesion, Christophe Béchu.
The last such powerful ones date back to the early 2000s, according to an AFP timeline.
It occurred at 6:38 p.m. in the town of Cram-Chaban, halfway between La Rochelle and Niort, according to the geographical coordinates of Renass and BCSF.
In the department of Deux-Sèvres, “a lightly injured person was taken care of by the emergency services” and “numerous material damages were reported in the south-west of the department”, indicated in a press release the prefecture, specifying that “ some buildings may have been affected (falling rocks, cracks)”.
In Charente-Maritime, the first “elements collected by the firefighters and the police do not report any casualties”, assured the prefecture.
“On the other hand, many material damages such as cracks have been reported on buildings and 1,100 homes are currently without electricity, a high voltage line having been affected,” she added.
The effects of this earthquake were particularly felt in Rennes, Bordeaux and Limoges, according to AFP journalists.
In Tours, Léa Franke, a law student, was “quietly installed” on her bed reading a book when she felt her bed was shaking. “I got up and there my whole apartment shook: the mirror hanging on the wall, the microwave, the glasses, etc. It lasted a few seconds and then it stopped,” she told AFP.
“I was very scared, I am on the 3rd floor of a building so high up, I thought the ground was going to collapse”.
The firefighters of Charente-Maritime, “faced with a large number of calls”, published a press release asking to “contact the emergency services only by emergency necessity”.
In Loire-Atlantique, “the earthquake generated more than a hundred calls without any intervention”, according to the firefighters.
In mainland France, earthquakes with a magnitude equal to or greater than 5 are rare. The previous one dates back to 2019 in the Drôme.