“There won’t be a lot of Chablis this year”… The violent hailstorms that fell on the Chablis vineyard (Yonne) on Wednesday evening caused “very significant” damage.
“It’s all chopped up. There is nothing left,” laments Jean-Paul Durup, owner of the estate of the same name in Maligny. He claims to have “never seen a storm like this”. “This plot is completely toast,” he explains, showing the first shoots completely torn by the hail, even though they had just emerged from the porcini mushrooms.
On Wednesday evening, the Chablis region was crossed by two “hail-producing supercells”, according to Météo-France, causing hailstones, sometimes as large as walnuts, to fall in places. “There has been some hail before but never like this,” says Jean Durup, walking on layers covering the ground between the rows of vines.
“In some places, we are at 100% loss”
“The damage is quite significant in certain villages,” said the vice-president of the Chablis Producers Association, Frédéric Gueguen. “The shoots on the vines are still young and therefore fragile,” he emphasizes, without being able to assess the amount of damage.
“There won’t be a lot of Chablis this year,” predicts Arnaud Nahan, co-owner of Domaine du Chardonnay. And added: “The hail ravaged a good part of the entire vineyard. In some places, we are at 100% loss.” “It’s a disaster this year,” he underlines, recalling that he “will have had everything this year”, after an episode of frost last week and the significant Easter floods which completely covered the estate at the edge. of the Serene River.
The Chablis vineyard covers nearly 6,000 hectares. More than 67% of sales are made for export.