The tornado that hit the towns of Pétange and Bascharage on the evening of 9 August 2019 sparked a great outpouring of solidarity across the country. Quickly, individuals, businesses, municipalities and associations sent donations to the two associations created to help disaster victims.

This Monday 26 April, the two associations, Käerjeng hëlleft and Fir e gudden Zweck - Gemeng Péiteng, took stock of these payments. In all, they received €1,025,619 through 1,746 payments via the first association and 1,737 via the second.

The total amount was able to be distributed among the victims of this climatic event who received neither aid from insurance nor from the family ministry.

Representatives of the two associations explain that 4,000 files had been opened with insurance companies and that, according to the Association of Insurance and Reinsurance Companies (Aca), €70m were paid by them during this first phase.

Secondly, the family ministry, for its part, compensated 36 claimants out of the hundred or so cases it received, for a total of €384,878.

€980,000 distributed among 147 files

It was only then that donations came into play to compensate people who were not supported in these first two phases.

€980,000 were paid in three phases: €414,000 in June 2020, €233,000 in July and €93,857 in April of this year. In total, 147 cases were supported.

The remainder of the donations will be used to replant trees on the territories of the two municipalities, where many were destroyed by the tornado's passage.

This article was originally published in French on Paperjam and has been translated and edited for Delano.