“The neighbor saw a big flash, thought it was fireworks. In fact, it was the house next door that was on fire. It was most likely an electrical surge due to the storm: a cable caught fire after a lightning strike. The residents were moved by the family,” says firefighter Pascal Bouissou, in charge of rescue operations this Monday evening.
The gendarmerie, the mayor of Agnos, EDF and Enedis were on the scene. Enedis agents equipped the damaged home with a generator, given that one of the tenants uses a respirator daily. Also according to the firemen, the fire broke out from the roof. They managed to put out the fire at around 22.00.
The hospital: working late?
Before that, they had been called to a flood at the Oloron Hospital Centre. Another, some say. “Every time there's a big storm, it's the same thing. There is work that should have been done that wasn't,” indicates a source from the hospital.
In fact, just a year ago, September 11, 2023the hospital in Oloron had already suffered a significant flood after a big storm that was accompanied by even heavier rains than this Monday, September 2: many sectors of the hospital had been flooded, including the morgue. At the time, the duty manager mentioned a problem with the waterproofing of a roof – which needed to be fixed as soon as possible, he promised – and with the exhaust grilles. Last night, the morgue was flooded again.
At the same time, the firefighters had to intervene in the Lanneretonne area, for the flooding of the Charont printing house, victim of a water leak.
Two explosions
Finally, by the time we joined the fire brigade at around 11.15pm, they were battling the last embers of a van that had caught fire, under the rue de Rocgrand, on the banks of the Gave d' Aspe, still in Oloron.
Alexandra, a resident of the neighborhood, explains that she heard an explosion around 10:30 p.m. “I looked out the window and saw that it was burning, with flames rising very high. I immediately called the fire department. When I went down to wait for them, I saw a second explosion of white light. At the time, it felt weird…,” she confessed.
Fear of being too late
While the rain was still falling in large drops, Alexandra stayed below, waiting for the firemen to finish their work, “so she wouldn't have to worry anymore. » His greatest fear at that moment was to imagine that someone was in the truck when it exploded. “That would mean I'm too late…”