From Bordeaux to Rennes via Limoges or La Rochelle, many residents felt the earth shake and multiplied calls for firefighters.
A powerful earthquake. An earthquake occurred at 6:38 p.m., Friday June 16, in the town of Cram-Chaban (Charente-Maritime), near Mauzé-sur-le-Mignon (Deux-Sèvres), halfway between La Rochelle and Niort. The violent tremor is of a magnitude of 5.3 to 5.8 according to the National Seismic Monitoring Network (Renass) and the French Central Seismological Bureau (BCSF). A lightly injured person was taken care of by the emergency services in Deux-Sèvres. In Charente-Maritime, homes were deprived of electricity. Franceinfo summarizes what we know about this earthquake.
One minor injury and material damage
In the Deux-Sèvres, in Mauzé-sur-le-Mignon, “a lightly injured person was taken care of by the emergency services”, according to a report from the prefecture. The prefect reported material damage to buildings, mainly cracks and falling rocks. For this reason, part of the city center of Niort, the prefecture of the department, was cordoned off during the evening.
“It is especially towards the epicenter, in the south of the agglomeration community of Niort” that the earthquake was felt most strongly, “between Mauzé-sur-le-Mignon, Arçais, Saint-Hilaire-la-Palud, that the material damage is the most numerous”, said Friday on franceinfo Jérôme Baloge, mayor of Niort and president of the agglomeration community of Niortais. According to initial findings, “cracks” have been detected, and “two churches are partly affected”.
In Charente-Maritime, a neighboring department, the prefecture also reports a lot of material damage. But no casualties were reported by the emergency services. Roofs collapsed in La Laigne, franceinfo learned from the mayor of this town in Charente-Maritime. All the inhabitants evacuated their houses because of the risk of collapse. They all gathered in the middle of this village, according to a journalist from France Télévisions on the spot.
Thousands of homes without electricity
More than a thousand homes were without electricity in Charente-Maritime early Friday evening, due to a high voltage line which was affected, according to the authorities. The prefecture has put forward the figure of 1,100 households concerned. In Cram-Chaban, the epicenter of the earthquake, electricity was still not restored at 11:15 p.m., according to the Enedis site, whose teams are seeking to restore “power supply as soon as possible”.
A tremor felt miles away
An earthquake was felt in a good part of western France: in Le Mans, in Angers, in La Rochelle, in Poitiers, in Bordeaux, but also in Brittany. In Mayenne, residents felt “the ground moving”, “the house creaking”, reports France Bleu Mayenne. In the live of franceinfo also, many comments also evoked the earthquake, felt in very many cities of the West: Rennes, Poitiers, Le Mans, Bordeaux, Tours, Angers, Nantes… Many Internet users testified to the jolt and their disbelief on social media.
One of the “strongest” earthquakes recorded in mainland France
“This is one of the strongest earthquakes recorded in metropolitan France”underlined the Minister of Ecological Transition and Territorial Cohesion, Christophe Béchu. In mainland France, the last earthquake with a magnitude greater than 5 dates back to 2019 at Le Teil, in Ardèche. “On average, there is one every 10 years in metropolitan France”Jérôme Vergne, seismologist at the Earth and Environment Institute in Strasbourg, told AFP. “In the region, the last of a fairly similar magnitude dates back to 1972 in Oléron. So for the region of the great west, it is really an important event”he added.
Sur franceinfo, Yann Klinger, seismologist and CNRS researcher at the Institut de physique du globe de Paris, explained: “It’s an area that doesn’t move very often, but has sustained activity.” “These are remnants of old faults that were active a very long time ago. They are mainly located south of the Armorican massif. So we have this residual activity”he added.