• On September 21, 2001, at 10:17 am, the AZF factory exploded in Toulouse, causing the death of 31 dead, causing 2,500 injuries and considerable damage.

  • Injured, shocked, the people of Toulouse present that day describe scenes of panic but also of desolation.

  • Ten days after the attacks of September 11, and while information circulated with difficulty, some remember the rumors that circulated the first minutes, before knowing that it was about the explosion of the chemical plant.

It was a Friday like any other in Toulouse.

In the middle of the morning of September 21, 2001, everyone was going about their business before the weekend, traffic was still heavy on the ring road well after rush hour.

In schools, recess was underway or had just ended.

“We had just returned to class, listening to the start of our teacher's lesson, when all of a sudden the class shook for 1 to 2 seconds.

A school friend made a little joke about a mammoth coming into school.

There was a burst of laughter from the students and suddenly the breath, the windows that suddenly opened, a slight panic, the teacher made us all put under our tables ”, remembers with

20 Minutes

, Yoann , now 32 years old.

Ten days after 9/11, rumors spread

Like all the inhabitants of the Pink City, he has not forgotten this explosion at the AZF factory which at 10:17 am plunged Toulouse into chaos.

Within minutes, many locals believed it had occurred a few feet away from where they were.

“I was working on The Union, we heard a thud and my ears hurt.

We thought it was a truck hitting the wall of our office, ”says Sophie.

The rumor of the explosion of the armory of the gendarmerie barracks of Courrège spreads.

Others believe that it was the United States Embassy on Jean-Jaurès alleys that was targeted.

Ten days after the attacks of September 11, the specter of the terrorist threat was then in everyone's mind. This September 21, Chantal was in New York. "These are people in the street who heard me speak French told me that there had been an attack on our premises," she shared on the 20 Minutes Facebook page. In Blagnac "Everyone was at the windows thinking of a plane crash ... The rumor of an attack quickly reached us", remembers Prune, 62 years old.

At the time, information did not have the relays of today's social networks.

“It was total incomprehension, everyone was trying to reach a loved one, a child, a spouse, but most of the lines were saturated.

And then this kind of yellowish cloud appeared, news reached us saying that people were on the ground in the streets, windows exploded, it was chaos ”, continues Prune.

"There were wounded everywhere"

Sébastien was in his final year at Lycée Déodat-de-Sévérac, located not far from the South Chemical Pole. He was still on hiatus when the explosion took place. “We felt the breath. It looked like the high school asphalt made the movement of a wave. I was thrown about three meters away, all the windows exploded. We ran in all directions to protect ourselves. There were injured people everywhere, a teacher asked me to take some to the nearest clinic. I have seen horrors, ”he testifies 20 years later.

Memories also engraved in the memory of Camille who still remembers the clothes she wore that day.

At the time, this CE1 student was tying her lace up again when the ground shook.

As she looked up, she saw the windows of her school explode one after the other.

She still remembers the image of mistresses carrying children who “had blood everywhere”.

But the rest faded over time.

"I was afraid of being burnt alive"

Sibylle has not forgotten anything, but she does not remember the explosion itself. Because when the stock of ammonium nitrates in hangar 221 detonated, this employee who worked for a subcontractor on the AZF site lost consciousness. “What I remember is that I woke up slowly under the rubble. I was lying in the rubble and thought I was having a nightmare and that I was going to wake up soon. I had a big pain in my right foot and I came to myself little by little. I was like "no, this is a nightmare, I'm going to wake up, I'm going to wake up", but I realized that everything is real. I understood that it was an explosion but I was far from imagining the magnitude ”, remembers the one who is part of the 2.500 people injured in the disaster that claimed the lives of 31 others.

Completely blocked, she heard voices for the first time looking for victims on the site, but could not be heard. Hearing cracklings, she believed in a fire and was "very afraid of being burnt alive", to the point of wanting to "lose consciousness again so as not to suffer". After a week in hospital, months of rehabilitation to treat her multiple fractures, this 53-year-old Toulouse woman still retains "some physical and psychological after-effects."

It was firefighters who eventually found her. Many rescuers intervened on the site to bring the injured out of the rubble. Guillaume was 26 years old and was a civil security rescuer. When he arrived at the edge of the crater, he discovered "a real war scene". "Rubble everywhere on the road, projected vehicles, exploded windows and the incessant noise of alarm sirens", explains the forty-something.

Around 450 people worked for the AZF company. Like Arlette, who at 10:17 am was on the phone with Ghislaine, an employee of Atofina, in the Rhône. The latter remembers the last moments of their conversation. “She saw firefighters running all over the place during the first explosion. Our communication was cut off during the second. She is deceased ”, testifies this employee of the chemical industry, 59 years old.

Twenty of the 31 people who died were on the AZF site itself.

A factory that had to be quickly secured to avoid an accident.

Just like the National Company of powders and explosives which produced nearby dangerous products.

To achieve this, reinforcements came from all over France.

Henri was a safety coordinator for the SNPE, in Isère.

He was called in to secure his group's company's phosgene workshop.

“It was apocalyptic and I could see the dismay and immense sadness for the staff at the site,” he wrote.

Solidarity momentum

But beyond the shock, this day was also marked by solidarity. That of rest caregivers, who did not wait to be called to join the hospitals. Béatrice, a nurse at Rangueil, remembers it as if it were yesterday. “I went up to my department and we sent able-bodied patients home to receive any injured patients. An impossible day to forget ”.

Sometimes that momentum has been around the corner.

Martine found it among the inhabitants of Lardenne.

This employee of the rectorate worked on September 21 in the walls of the Gallieni high school where a student died.

After the shock of the explosion and the assistance to the wounded colleagues, she tried to return home, discovering unbelievable scenes as they advanced.

Arrived in the district of the Arenas, she asked a lady if she could take her to Colomiers.

It was the latter's husband who drove her back to her home.

She subsequently tried to find this couple to thank them, in vain.

“It's been 20 years, but I still think of this wonderful family that I thank every year with my thoughts,” she concludes.

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