Lille (AFP)
The situation at the port of Dover, where thousands of trucks were stuck for several days, is returning to normal and traffic to Calais "weakens sharply", after the passage of 2,200 heavy goods vehicles on Friday and 1,500 on Saturday at 6:00 p.m., the management announced. from the port of Calais.
"We recorded a traffic of 1,000 heavyweights on Thursday from Dover, 2,200 on Friday and at 6:00 p.m. today, we recorded 1,500. Import traffic has weakened sharply in recent hours because the situation has resolved in the United Kingdom ", told AFP the deputy managing director of the company which operates the ports of Calais and Boulogne-sur-Mer, Benoît Rochet.
Friday, Christmas Day, the port had remained exceptionally open, the ferry companies embarked vehicles only in the direction Dover-Calais.
On the side of the Channel Tunnel, some 1,000 trucks had crossed from Folkestone (England) to Coquelles on Saturday around 6 p.m., against 400 in the other direction, according to a spokesperson for Getlink, the operator of the tunnel.
While storm Bella must hit northwestern France overnight, with gusts of up to 130 km / h over exposed headlands, "we are closely monitoring the various advisories. Shipping companies will adapt their services to depending on the conditions recorded, "said the management of the port of Calais.
But "the traffic being very low, any delays would have little impact," she added.
Thousands of drivers found themselves stranded when France, worried about a new strain of the potentially more contagious novel coronavirus identified in the south-east of England, closed its borders to arrivals from the United Kingdom at midnight on Sunday.
Including Dover, the main cross-Channel port, and the neighboring tunnel, through which thousands of heavy goods vehicles circulate every day.
If France has allowed traffic to resume Wednesday morning, it requires a negative test, requiring days of work to check the positive or negative status of the Covid.
© 2020 AFP