After the bad weather combined with the strike of the garbage collectors, the fear of maritime pollution in Marseille – LCI

Following the heavy floods that hit the Bouches-du-Rhône on Sunday night Monday, the city of Marseille finds itself under water but also under waste. And for good reason, the rains fell on the city of Marseille, only a few days after the end of a garbage collection strike, which lasted a week.

As a result, hundreds of tons of waste flowed through the streets of Marseille to head straight for the Mediterranean Sea. A catastrophic situation both ecological and health, which worries elected officials and residents alike.

“Red vigilance in Marseille also means pollution of the coastline by waste and wastewater which flows into the Mediterranean through the Huveaune”, warned Nathalie Morand, elected ecologist of the PACA region, while sharing on Twitter photos of the beach littered with rubbish.

Deputy Mayor of Marseille, Hervé Menchon has also published pictures of the Huveaune river, speaking of a real “race against time” started this Monday: “The Marins-Pompiers are going to regroup the gas cylinders at the port of Pointe Rouge. A zodiac from the Calanques park has come into action to push back the waste that could end up in the park. Huge anger at this ecocide which could be in large part avoid.”

Local residents were also worried about the path taken by these tons of garbage, not yet collected. This is the case of Mathieu Grapeloup, member of an NGO and founder of a Facebook page, “Marseille à la loupe”: “The bad weather in Marseille is an ecological disaster. The torrential rains arrive in a context where the city is crumbling under the trash because of the past strike and the waste is scattered to the four corners of the city and goes towards the sea. catastrophic! “

This Monday, the Minister of the Sea Annick Girardin reacted in turn by posting a video of rubbish washed away by rainwater (see the tweet above). “Sad scene in Marseille where all this waste will end up in the Mediterranean Sea… The discussions between the trade union groups and the metropolis must not make us forget the essential: we are all responsible for our seas and our oceans!”

While the Aix-Marseille metropolis is responsible for waste management, its president Martine Vassal indicated on Twitter that a point had been made this Monday, during the council of the presidents of metropolitan territory, on bad weather but also on “the resumption of waste collection on the territory with the points to prioritize”.

If it seems difficult to assess the extent of the potential damage, the waste that accumulated during the strike could not all be collected since the resumption of work by the garbage collectors on October 1 in the 1st, 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th arrondissements. And “the meteorological disturbances complicated the collection operations on (Monday) morning, making the circulation of skips impossible in certain sectors of the 8th, 9th, 11th, 12th and 13th arrondissements of Marseille”, said the metropolis, in a press release.

If 650 agents were charged this Monday to clean these districts as best they could, their collection mission was interrupted “to favor the cleaning of the drains (in order to allow the good evacuation of rainwater) and the collection of the skips of the professionals”, according to this press release. But isn’t it already too late, when most of the garbage that still littered the streets of Marseille overnight from Sunday to Monday has already reached the coast?

In an interview with AFP, biologist Isabelle Poitou, director of the MerTerre association, explains the urgency of the situation: “Tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, this floating waste will be pushed by the easterly wind, towards the beaches of Frioul for example. It is essential to come and pick up the waste on the beaches on Tuesday or Wednesday. But often, outside the periods summer, waste cleaning is not planned. However, action should be taken before the waste is scattered in the sea at the first gust of wind “.

If the red rain and flood alert has been lifted in the department, a strong mistral is precisely expected in Marseille, according to Météo France, which forecasts gusts of up to 45 km / h on Tuesday and up to 55 km / h on Wednesday .