Storm Austen: one dead in France as about 242,000 French customers and 19,000 UK homes lose power

Storm Austen, the first named storm of the season, crossed northern and western France and southern Britain on Friday 23 October, bringing gusts of more than 140 km/h on the French coast.

The prefecture of the Manche department in Normandy said a 62-year-old man died in Helleville after a cardiac arrest. He had called firefighters while trying to saw through a fallen tree trunk, and they could not revive him, Ouest-France reported. Two other people in the department were in a critical condition after separate accidents, the prefecture said.

Grid operator Enedis said in its latest bulletin on Friday that about 242,000 customers were without electricity, including 82,100 in Normandy, 65,800 in Brittany, 32,100 in Hauts-de-France, 28,200 in Pays de la Loire and 7,800 in Centre-Val de Loire. The Keraunos observatory recorded a gust of 161 km/h at the Pointe du Raz in Brittany, and 148 km/h was recorded at Fécamp in Normandy. Rail operator SNCF halted all trains in Normandy on Friday and said services would resume gradually on Saturday afternoon.

In the UK, more than 19,000 homes were without power in southern England and Wales, the BBC reported on Friday. Gusts reached 84mph (135 km/h) in Jersey, schools in Jersey and Guernsey were closed, and fallen trees blocked railway lines and roads. Part of Brighton’s West Pier, a derelict structure that first opened in 1866, collapsed into the sea.

The Met Office has issued an amber wind warning for Saturday and Sunday for much of Scotland, the far north of England and the far north of Northern Ireland as a further storm, Storm Boelo, approaches, with gusts of 60-70mph forecast.