The day after a strong storm hit France, people who had to get to work had trouble on both roads and trains. The bad weather that hit on Wednesday night caused trees to fall, power outages, and problems with transportation that lasted until Thursday, June 26.
Traffic is Stuck on the Roads
By 9 a.m., France’s roads were clogged with over 1,350 kilometers of traffic jams, a staggering 300 kilometers more than a typical Thursday morning, according to Bison Futé.
In the Île-de-France region around Paris, drivers had to deal with backups that were almost 500 kilometres long, which is much longer than the usual 320 kilometres reported by Sytadin. After the storms, there was debris and downed power lines that made morning commutes a test of patience.
Rail Services in Chaos
Train travelers faced even greater challenges. A lot of RER and Transilien lines in Île-de-France were badly affected.
- The RER C was completely closed between Pontoise and Montigny-Beauchamp, which caused delays all along the line.
- The RER E also saw disruptions.
- Transilien lines H and K crawled along at a snail’s pace.
- A fallen tree on the J line stopped service between Mantes-la-Jolie and Conflans-Sainte-Honorine.
The mess wasn’t just in Paris:
| Region | Affected Line(s) | Issue |
|---|---|---|
| Auvergne | Saint-Germain-des-Fossés – Nevers | Tree on tracks |
| Normandy | Paris-Orléans & Nomad lines | Service disruptions |
| Nouvelle-Aquitaine | Brive – Ussel | Line shut down |
| Hauts-de-France | Amiens – Paris (TER) | Power lines down in Gannes, no trains both directions |
A post on the regional TER’s X account said that SNCF Réseau teams were sent to clean up the damage and hoped to have service back up and running by 10 a.m.
A Region in Shock
The storms left their mark from Île-de-France to Normandy, Centre-Val de Loire, and Auvergne, knocking down trees and flooding roads. Even though cleanup and repair crews worked nonstop, the problems were a clear reminder of how powerful nature can be to stop daily life. For people who had to go to work in the morning, it was less about getting to work and more about dealing with the storm’s messy aftermath.