By Manon Cruz and Lauren Bacquie
POMAS, France/PARIS, Aug 25 (Reuters) - A tornado swept through a village in the Aude region of southwestern France late on Monday, destroying homes and injuring dozens, authorities said, describing it as a rare and traumatic event.
Around 300 of the 500 houses in the village of Pomas have been damaged, officials said, adding that 100 of the damaged ones may no longer be safe to live in.
Everyone in the village has been evacuated while officials check the houses' safety. None of the injured are in critical condition.
"It's apocalyptic," said 41-year-old Vanessa, who found herself stuck in her house when the tornado hit, unable to shut the windows because the wind was so strong. "We told ourselves that it's going to be the end because we saw it coming straight at us."
"We were in the eye of the storm," she told Reuters, her voice shaking with sobs. "We didn't know what was going to happen, it was so fast. We didn't have time for anything actually, we were saying, 'What is happening, what is happening?!'"
The tornado struck as this summer's intense heatwave gave way this week to thunderstorms in many areas of southern France.
The tornado left a trail of destruction in Pomas, with some houses reduced to rubble, while others were left with no roof, or with parts of walls torn down.
France has a few dozen tornadoes a year, far fewer than the United States, where more than 1,000 are recorded each year.
They are also usually mild in France, making the destruction seen in Pomas a rare case.
"The Pomas tornado was truly intense, causing severe damage to the municipality," Meteo-France expert Francois Jobard said, adding that winds likely hit 200 kilometers per hour or more.
Jobard said that while the increase in the number and intensity of storms was linked to climate change, it was not possible at this stage to draw similar conclusions for tornadoes, with studies on that matter still ongoing.
(Additional reporting by Dominique Vidalon, Ingrid Melander, Sudip Kar-Gupta; writing by Ingrid Melander; Editing by Lincoln Feast, Conor Humphries and Edwina Gibbs)
