On an August afternoon in 1845 a tornado tore through the Cailly valley north of Rouen in Normandy, flattening three large textile mills and hundreds of trees along a 15 km path. It is the strongest tornado ever recorded in France.
▶ Open on the mapHeavy pieces of the mills were found 30 km away.
Two French scientists drew its zigzag path in a book in 1876, one of the first scientific studies of a tornado in Europe.