Earthquake struck southwestern France with a magnitude of 5.3 to 5.8 on the Richter scale: “It was very noticeable” | outside

French media reported that the earthquake was felt in central Bordeaux and in the cities of Limoges and Rennes. Damage was reported in villages near the epicenter and one person was injured in the town of Mauzé-sur-le-Mignon, according to Minister of Environmental Transition Christophe Picchu.

More than 1,000 families in the Charente-Maritimes region were without electricity because a high-voltage line was damaged. In the same area, in the commune of La Laigne, the fire brigade declared dozens of houses uninhabitable, and the bell tower had large cracks.

The earthquake lasted only a few seconds.

Wim, from West Flanders, runs the Chambre d’hôtes about 50 kilometers from La Rochelle and has lived in France since 2016. “I was standing on the balcony by my pool,” he told our editors over the phone. “The first shock was very light, then it was heavier and then again it was lighter.”

He has no harm to his home at first sight. “There is currently no damage here in our village,” Wim says. “We were left without electricity or internet for 45 minutes.” Moreover, it was now calm again in the village of La Petite Tanière after the initial confusion: “Everyone had left the house and the dogs had started barking. I noticed that something strange was happening.”

Strong earthquakes are rare in France. As far as is known, the strongest earthquake in the country, in Provence in 1909, had a magnitude of 6.2. There were many victims. In the area that was bombed on Friday, the earth shook again since the early 1970s.

Science journalist Martin Peeters explains that France has fault lines in three regions: the region from Strasbourg to Nice, the Pyrenees region and finally the band that runs from the northwest to the southeast of France, where Friday’s earthquake occurred. Usually, seismic activity in the latter region is less intense than in the other two regions. The last earthquake occurred in 2019 in the Ardeche region of the Nice-Strasbourg region.