People in Crestview were relieved earlier in the week when they learned that a killer winter storm that crashed into western Europe largely spared their sister city, Noirmoutier-en-l’Île, and surrounding towns on the west coast island of Noirmoutier.

The storm, named Xynthia, had hurricane-strength winds and brought 8-meter (26-foot) waves crashing into some coastal communities and caused 45 deaths elsewhere in France, according to The Times of London. The Times report said three people drowned in the coastal Vendée region, which includes Noirmoutier.

“Sometimes you have hurricanes in Florida, yesterday night we had also big troubles in our area,” reported Gérard Moreau, a member of Noirmoutier’s sister city committee Monday morning.

“In the south of Vendée, close to La Rochelle, sea walls were broken by the very big waves and a lot of houses are now under 1 meter (39 inches) of water from the sea,” Moreau said.

“In Noirmoutier, there is really less troubles, except the sea [flooded] the fields due to the high level of the sea and the spring tides,” Moreau continued. “In the Noirmoutier harbour, the sea arrived above the level of the stone walls and some shops were cleaning their floor due to the water inside.”

“We had a lot of problems with the storm, especially in my work,” confirmed Anthony Brochard, who lives in L’Epine, a town neighboring Noirmoutier, and works for a transportation company. “We have dead fish in my business.”

“Noirmoutier was more effected than the three other towns (L’Epine, Barbatre and La Guérinière),” Franck Fischback, a reporter for the regional newspaper Le Courrier Vendéen, told the News Bulletin. “A seawall broke and water came into the landscape. Some boats were inverted, and in Herbaudière’s harbour, some docks were broken.”

Moreau said that people who live in the forest on the east side of the island awoke to find seaweed by their front gates. “The sea escaped from the beach and get into the forest,” he said.

As Xynthia came ashore, several people died in Spain and Portugal, two countries that, like France, have Atlantic seacoasts. In western France, high-speed TGV express train service was interrupted due to track flooding, the French rail operator SNCF reported. Noirmoutier’s low elevation caused concern as the winds drove waves to land.

“As you know, a lot of places are under the high level of the sea in our island and we were very anxious about the meteorological forecast” as the storm approached, Moreau said. “Happily for us, the result was not so bad and our families and friends had no trouble.”