Cyclone Martin was an extremely violent

European windstorm European windstorms are powerful extratropical cyclones which form as cyclonic windstorms associated with areas of low atmospheric pressure. They can occur throughout the year, but are most frequent between October and March, with peak inten ...

which crossed southern Europe on 27–28 December 1999, causing severe damage across

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan ar ...

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = '' Plus ultra'' ( Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , ...

, Switzerland and

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

one day after

Cyclone Lothar Cyclone Lothar is regarded as the worst European windstorm recorded during the 20th century. Crossing France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Germany between 25 December and 27 December 1999, Cyclone Lothar resulted in 110 fatalities (inclu ...

had affected similar areas. Wind speeds reached around in French department of

Charente-Maritime Charente-Maritime () is a department in the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region on the southwestern coast of France. Named after the river Charente, its prefecture is La Rochelle. As of 2019, it had a population of 651,358 with an area of 6,864 square ...

. The storm caused 30 fatalities and €6 billion in damages. Combined with Lothar, Cyclone Martin is often referred to as the ''Storm of the Century'' in western and central Europe.

Meteorological history

December 1999 saw a series of heavy winter storms cross the North Atlantic and western Europe. In early December, Great Britain and Denmark were hit by

Cyclone Anatol Anatol is the name given by the Free University of Berlin (the Danish TV2 channel named it "Adam" also often referred to as ''århundredets orkan'' (storm of the century) or ''Decemberorkanen'' (December Hurricane) in Denmark, and commonly as Caro ...

which caused severe damage in Denmark. A second storm then crossed Europe on 12 December. A very deep and sizeable depression, named ''Cyclone Kurt'', moved across Britain on the night of 24–25 December, analysed to have possibly reached a low of 938 mb between Scotland and Norway. This set up a large area of westerly flow into Europe, along which

was rapidly carried into mainland Europe. This highly unstable situation inevitably meant low predictability, and saw an unusually straight and strong jet stream (similar circumstances were also noted the day before the arrival of the Great Storm of 1987). Storms Lothar and Martin december 1999

Following along the Jet Stream immediately behind Lothar, Cyclone Martin then struck France and central Europe from 26 to 28 December 1999. Atmospheric conditions remained unstable over western Europe, and at the end of January 2000 two additional damaging storms crossed Denmark and the northern part of Germany.

Aftermath

Cyclone Martin caused extensive damage to property and trees across southern France. In terms of felled trees, 13,000,000 m³/459,090,667 ft³ of wood in Switzerland and 140,000,000 m³/4,944,053,340 ft³ were felled in France. The French and German national power grids were also left badly affected, with more than 200 electricity pylons destroyed. Buildings and infrastructure suffered major damage throughout Martin's path, and mains power and safety systems were knocked out in many places. The

storm surge A storm surge, storm flood, tidal surge, or storm tide is a coastal flood or tsunami-like phenomenon of rising water commonly associated with low-pressure weather systems, such as cyclones. It is measured as the rise in water level above the ...

from Cyclone Martin led to severe flooding at the

Blayais Nuclear Power Plant The Blayais Nuclear Power Plant is a nuclear plant on the banks of the Gironde estuary near Blaye, France operated by Électricité de France. Description The power plant has 4 pressurized water reactors – producing 951 MW gross and 910 ...

, resulting in a Level 2 nuclear incident on the

International Nuclear Event Scale The International Nuclear and Radiological Event Scale (INES) was introduced in 1990 by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in order to enable prompt communication of safety significant information in case of nuclear accidents. The ...

.COMMUNIQUE N°7 – INCIDENT SUR LE SITE DU BLAYAIS
ASN, published 30 December 1999, Retrieved 22 March 2011

Highest winds

Below is a table of the highest wind speeds recorded during Cyclone Martin.

References

External links

* Met Office, University of Exeter & University of Reading Extreme Wind Storm Catalogue
Martin
* Eumetrain

* ttp://www.annales.org/ri/2002/425/bessemoulin009-14.pdf Les tempêtes en France
Details of damage in France (pdf)
{{European windstorms

Martin Martin may refer to: Places * Martin City (disambiguation) * Martin County (disambiguation) * Martin Township (disambiguation) Antarctica * Martin Peninsula, Marie Byrd Land * Port Martin, Adelie Land * Point Martin, South Orkney Islands Aus ...

1999 meteorology 1999 in France 1999 in Italy

December 1999 events in Europe 1999 disasters in Italy 1999 disasters in France

Meteorological history

Aftermath

Highest winds

See also

References

External links