Une supercellule frappe près de Bourges

We are considering ourselves very lucky this morning. Yesterday afternoon, a super-cell thunder and hail storm swept across the landscape just north of Bourges. The town of Mehun-sur-Yèvre, where there is a porcelain factory and outlet that I visited with friends in April, suffered widespread wind and hail damage. The roof of a supermarket in Mehun collapsed into the building.

The village just to the east of Mehun, Preuilly (pop. 380), fared even worse, with 80% of the buildings in the village suffering damage. A woman I heard interviewed on the morning news said they had torrential rain and hailstones 7 centimeters deep covered the ground. Preuilly is just 40 miles southeast of Saint-Aignan. The vineyards in the Reuilly and Quincy grape-growing areas were badly damaged by falling hailstones.

Over this past weekend, a village just north of the city of Rouen in Normandy, was hit by a tornado. I remember that when I lived in Rouen in 1972-73, it rained a lot, but it was mostly drizzle. Nobody there had ever imagined there could be a tornado in Normandy. People are starting to realize how much the climate here has already changed. And the worst is still to come, in all probability.