{"id":1169455,"date":"2026-08-26T00:34:17","date_gmt":"2026-08-26T00:34:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1169455\/"},"modified":"2026-08-26T00:34:17","modified_gmt":"2026-08-26T00:34:17","slug":"tornado-wreaks-havoc-in-village-in-south-western-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/1169455\/","title":{"rendered":"Tornado wreaks havoc in village in south-western France"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong>Pomas\/Paris, France<\/strong><br \/><a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>Reuters<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>A tornado swept through a village in the Aude region of south-western France late on Monday, destroying homes and injuring dozens, authorities said, describing it as a rare and traumatic event.<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Around 300 of the 500 houses in the village of Pomas have been damaged, officials said, adding that 100 of the damaged ones may no longer be safe to live in.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-180744\" src=\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/France-Pomas-damage-after-tornado-25062608.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1200\" height=\"800\"  \/><br \/>View of a damaged car and debris from destroyed houses a day after a tornado struck the village of Pomas, near Carcassonne, in the Aude department, southern France, on 25th August, 2026. PICTURE: Reuters\/Manon Cruz<\/p>\n<p>Everyone in the village has been evacuated while officials check the houses\u2019 safety. None of the injured are in critical condition.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s apocalyptic,\u201d said 41-year-old Vanessa, who found herself stuck in her house when the tornado hit, unable to shut the windows because the wind was so strong. \u201cWe told ourselves that it\u2019s going to be the end because we saw it coming straight at us.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe were in the eye of the storm,\u201d she told Reuters, her voice shaking with sobs. \u201cWe didn\u2019t know what was going to happen, it was so fast. We didn\u2019t have time for anything actually, we were saying, \u2018What is happening, what is happening?!&#8217;\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The tornado struck as this summer\u2019s intense heatwave gave way this week to thunderstorms in many areas of southern France.<\/p>\n<p>\t<strong>We rely on our readers to fund Sight&#8217;s work &#8211; become a financial supporter today!<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>The tornado left a trail of destruction in Pomas, with some houses reduced to rubble, while others were left with no roof, or with parts of walls torn down.<\/p>\n<p>France has a few dozen tornadoes a year, far fewer than the United States, where more than 1,000 are recorded each year.<\/p>\n<p>They are also usually mild in France, making the destruction seen in Pomas a rare case.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Pomas tornado was truly intense, causing severe damage to the municipality,\u201d Meteo-France expert Francois Jobard said, adding that winds likely hit 200 kilometers per hour or more.<\/p>\n<p>Jobard said that while the increase in the number and intensity of storms was linked to climate change, it was not possible at this stage to draw similar conclusions for tornadoes, with studies on that matter still ongoing.<\/p>\n<p><strong>\u2013 Additional reporting by DOMINIQUE VIDALON, INGRID MELANDER and SUDIP KAR-GUPTA<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Pomas\/Paris, FranceReuters A tornado swept through a village in the Aude region of south-western France late on Monday,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1169456,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5309],"tags":[2000,299,36,317076,317308,50155],"class_list":["post-1169455","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-france","tag-eu","tag-europe","tag-france","tag-pomas","tag-pomas-tornado","tag-tornado"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1169455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1169455"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1169455\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1169456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1169455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1169455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1169455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}