Hundreds evacuated as floods continue

Hundreds of people have been evacuated in Ile de France, while 13 departments in the basins of the Seine, Saône and their tributaries remain on orange alert as flood waters continue to rise.

A total 150 of the 395 evacuees due to the floods are currently staying at a sports hall in Villeneuve-Saint-Georges, Val-de-Marne, a town at the confluence of the Yerres and Seine rivers. Meanwhile, some 14,000 homes are without power.

National forecaster Meteo-France lists Aube, Eure, Jura, Marne, Saône-et-Loire, Paris, Seine-et-Marne, Yvelines, Yonne, Hauts-de-Seine, Seine-Saint-Denis, Val-de-Marne and Val-d' Oise as being on orange alert, with river levels still rising.

A further seven - Ardèche, Aveyron, Cantal, Loire, Haute-Loire, Lozère and Puy-de-Dôme - are on orange alert for snow and ice.

In Paris, the Seine, which had reached 5.62m shortly after 6.30am on Friday at its official measuring point on the pont Austerlitz, and is expected to keep rising throughout the day before peaking between 5.8m and 6.2m over the weekend, flood monitor Vigicrues said.

In 1910, the Seine reached 8.6m.