When I moved to south-west France in 2021, I expected long, sunny summers and a gentler pace of life. Instead, I have lived through a tornado, two violent storms, floods and now the wildfires that have brought the Gironde to its knees. In the past ten days, I have been perilously close to the flames and witnessed something France has never seen before: a fire cloud.
My house sits on a hill with panoramic views, about 30 minutes north of Bordeaux. It has given me a front-row seat to some of the most extreme weather the region has ever experienced, and the most terrifying was the sight of a pyrocumulonimbus cloud building its own thunderstorm, throwing lightning and hurling embers up to 30 kilometres ahead of the fire front.
A succession of extreme weather events
In June 2022, I found myself in the eye of a tornado. A friend was staying, and together we battled against a horizontal sheet of rain that chewed up the garden, blew in and buckled my French doors, and tore tiles off the roof. The damage cost 12,000 euros.
Another almighty storm in June 2023 wrought havoc across my commune, destroying vines and bringing down trees. Then came 2024, a year marked by floods. Months and months of rain saw the banks of several rivers burst, flooding towns, villages and fields. Now, the wildfires have made everything seem crazy.
The statistics are staggering: 220,000 people have been evacuated from the Gironde and Landes, the biggest evacuation in France since the Second World War. Across France and Spain, 300,000 hectares have been scorched. No official assessment has yet been made of the animals lost.
A catastrophic toll on wildlife
France's minister for Ecological Transition, Monique Barbut, said the damage to wildlife in the region would be catastrophic, with significant losses among birds, deer and amphibians. Entire groups of deer have been photographed trapped at the forest's edge. One wildlife officer, speaking about areas such as Le Porge, said: “Nothing can survive. The fires came too early, at the height of the breeding season. Birds were nesting, fawns lay hidden in the undergrowth.”
Equally staggering has been the response of the people. Across the nation, volunteers have come together to supply food, clothing and shelter to the victims. Animal rescue centres are coordinating their efforts and gathering food, bedding and medication for lost and wounded animals. Jane Marple, an animal rescue veteran and head of a local animal association, told me: “This morning a new part of the inner evacuation zone opened for rescuers. This part of the fire zone has been closed since the fires started. We now have night goggles, as we know many animals will lay low during the day and move in the night.”
A community comes together
My friend and I took animal food to St Thomas de Conac, a small village on the estuary, where we met Mary with her van half-packed, ready to drive up to Ile d’Oleron. We had been told to avoid Bordeaux and head north with provisions. “Bordeaux, we’re coming,” read a post on social media, as a convoy of tractors carrying water tanks joined a motorway into the city. A fleet of ambulances crossed from the Dordogne to help with the evacuations.
Such displays of solidarity and comradeship make me incredibly proud to live in this country that I now call home. We are all in this together — apart from a few ex-pats who have complained that their swimming pools have been damaged by falling ash. Yes, really. I do have some sympathy for those gite owners who have lost bookings. The whole of France is not ablaze; it is a big country. The advice has only ever been to stay away from the Gironde and not to head south via the A63 into Spain, which is battling its own megafire.
Living in the shadow of the fires
If the fires had started 20 kilometres north of Bordeaux instead of west, I would not be writing this. I would be in an evacuation centre like the parc d’exposition, grateful for clothes, food and water, grateful to the firefighters working tirelessly to save lives. Friends of mine who live in Merignac, beside the airport, were evacuated and are still not home. Some German friends are still in the parc d’exposition, waiting to return to their holiday home to collect their belongings. Many of the evacuees were holidaymakers and tourists, but many locals have lost their houses, their pets and their livelihoods.
Last Friday, smoke from the Cap Ferat and Biscarosse fires travelled up the Gironde estuary and choked my neighbourhood. The ominous black cloud sat above us for almost 12 hours, dispensing no rain, just bangs and flashes from the thunder and lightning. At 9 o'clock on Saturday morning, my neighbours and I were transfixed by the eerie silence that followed. No birds, no wind, just an end-of-the-world glow coming from the south.
A stark reminder of our fragile world
As I write, the fires are stable but the smell of smoke still lingers. We suffered temperatures of 42C again yesterday, our third big canicule (a period of scorching heat) this year, and each time they last for days or weeks. Still no rain in my commune. My fruit trees have died. All around me, fields of maize and sunflowers are stunted. The grapes are splitting on the vines. Walking in forests is prohibited, as is hunting — no bad thing!
The French aren't good with rules; if we see one, we like to bend it or break it. But along with the camaraderie, I have witnessed a new respect for nature and the environment. We have just received a stark reminder of how fragile it all is, and we are working together to protect it. My adopted home of south-west France is beautiful, wild and charming — a million miles away from my former life in London. But I would not go back, no matter what the weather decides to fling at me.
