Severe storms strike Landes in southwest France, cutting power to 7,500 homes

Storm damage in Landes

Severe thunderstorms swept through southwest France during the evening of 23 August and continued into the early hours of 24 August 2026. The Landes department bore the brunt of the weather system, recording widespread flooding, roof damage, and fallen trees across approximately 20 municipalities. The town of Peyrehorade experienced intense localized destruction, where winds tore metal roofing sheets from buildings and uprooted trees onto vehicles and roadways. Floodwaters penetrated local commercial shops, private residences, and an elderly care facility (EHPAD), while municipal authorities opened an emergency reception centre that provided shelter to roughly 30 displaced residents. In Labatut, emergency services responded shortly after 22:00 when a falling tree crushed a passenger vehicle, injuring two occupants. Firefighters evacuated a 55-year-old man suffering head injuries to the hospital centre in Dax, while the second injured passenger received on-site medical attention.

Emergency interventions and fire starts

The thunderstorm front unleashed intense electrical activity, with the atmospheric observatory Keraunos recording nearly 3,000 lightning strikes after midnight. Lightning strikes ignited four overnight forest fires in Lespéron, Sort-en-Chalosse, Lévignac, and Onesse-et-Laharie, where the Sort-en-Chalosse blaze burned 2,000 square metres before crews brought it under control. By Monday morning, departmental fire services dispatched teams to extinguish three additional forest fire starts in Luxey and Morcenx-la-Nouvelle. Colonel Romain Moutard, second-in-command of the departmental fire and rescue service (SDIS), commented on the dry conditions that facilitated the morning fires.

There in an area where there was little rainfall.

Departmental emergency control centres logged 500 calls within a four-hour window during the height of the storm. Around 170 firefighters carried out more than 150 separate interventions across the department to saw through fallen timber, install protective tarpaulins on punctured roofs, pump inundated homes, and secure damaged sites such as the Camping des Gaves in Peyrehorade.

Road closures and railway gridlock

Widespread infrastructure damage left 7,500 households without electricity by 02:00 on Monday, with 3,500 homes still disconnected by late morning as utility technicians worked on damaged grids. Fallen trees and debris forced transport authorities to close several key regional thoroughfares, including the A641 motorway branch near Peyrehorade in both directions, alongside obstruction reports on the dual carriageway connecting Dax and Tartas near Pontonx-sur-l'Adour. Railway operator SNCF halted passenger trains between Dax and Hendaye after gale-force winds deposited debris across the tracks. In Pyrénées-Atlantiques, rail connections between Puyoô and Bayonne remained suspended from 06:35 with recovery operations underway, while services between Bordeaux and Arcachon faced delays from 06:00 until technical crews repaired a malfunctioning level crossing at 08:00.

Regional alerts and atmospheric forecasts

National meteorological agency Météo-France placed up to 18 departments under orange thunderstorm alerts stretching from the Pyrenees across the Massif Central toward the Mediterranean coast. Forecasters issued warnings for violent afternoon thunderstorm cells accompanied by localized wind gusts reaching up to 120 km/h, large hailstones, heavy precipitation rates, and intense lightning activity. Municipal teams and residents across the affected communes in Landes focused cleanup operations on clearing mud from domestic drainage systems and restoring essential facilities ahead of upcoming school reopenings.