Seven dead as Western Europe hit by record winds of Storm Ciaran
Seven people were killed as Storm Ciaran battered Western Europe on Thursday, bringing record winds as high as 200 kilometers per hour, floods, blackouts and major travel disruption.
In the Belgian city of Ghent, a five-year-old Ukrainian boy and a 64-year-old woman were killed by falling branches.
Falling trees had earlier killed a lorry driver in his vehicle in northern France's Aisne region, and French authorities also reported the death of a man who fell from his balcony in the port city of Le Havre.
A man in the Dutch town of Venray, a woman in central Madrid and a person in Germany also died.
Some 1.2 million French homes lost electricity overnight as the storm lashed the northwest coast. Almost 700,000 remained without power on Thursday evening, according to network manager Enedis.
More than one million residents were also cut off from the mobile telephone network, according to government minister Jean-Noel Barrot.
The wind gusts in the western Brittany region were "exceptional" and "many absolute records have been broken", national weather service Meteo-France said on X, formerly Twitter.
The prefect for the local department said gusts as high as 207 km/h (129 mph) were recorded at Pointe du Raz on the tip of the northwest coast, while the port city of Brest saw winds hit 156 km/h.
The wind gusts in France's western Brittany region were 'exceptional'