Aude valley floods · Day 11

40,000 people. Eleven days. No power.

Our teams have been in Limoux since the second night. We are running eight water points and a cash-grant desk, and we are funded through Friday. Not past it.

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Where the appeal stands

Updated every morning at 09:00 CET. The matched total is the one that closes on 31 August.

Emergency appeal€612000

€612,000 raised of a €900,000 target. The marker is the point at which every water point is funded to the end of September.

Matched by the Fondation Lacaze€180000

Matching stops at €250,000 or on 31 August, whichever comes first.

What has been delivered so far

1.2m

Litres of clean water

6,400

Shelter kits handed out

2,180

Families paid a cash grant

96c

Of every euro reaches the field

Choose an amount

Matched two-for-one until 31 August. Every tier is unrestricted — we spend it where it is worst that week.

Water

€25one-off

Filters 400 litres at a village tap point
Two jerrycans and purification tablets
Emailed spend report in September

Popular

Shelter

€80one-off

One family shelter kit: tarpaulin, rope, ground mat
Solar lantern and phone charger
Blankets for four people
Emailed spend report in September

Cash grant

€250one-off

A full month’s emergency grant for one household
Paid by card, spent locally, no vouchers
Keeps village shops trading
Named on the appeal wall if you wish

Standby

€15per month

Funds the next response before it makes the news
Cancel any time, no phone calls from us
Quarterly two-page field letter

Where the money is going this week

Two tanker runs a day to Couiza and Alet-les-Bains, where the mains are still contaminated. A cash desk at the Limoux gymnasium paying €250 per household by prepaid card. Sixty shelter kits a day to hamlets the road crews have not reached. Nothing is being warehoused.

A water tanker parked in a village square

Why cash, not crates

Ninety per cent of the shops in the valley reopened within a week and they need customers as badly as their customers need supplies. A prepaid card costs us €4 to administer and lets a family buy the specific things they lost. Airlifting tinned food from Lyon would cost six times as much and put the same shops out of business.

A cash grant desk set up in a sports hall

Fair questions to ask before you give

How much reaches the valley?

96 cents in the euro on this appeal. Our overhead is carried by a separate unrestricted core fund, and the audited split is published every February.

What happens to money raised after the emergency ends?

It stays in the Aude for the recovery phase — rebuilding wells, replacing tools, school equipment. If we raise more than the valley can absorb we will say so publicly and ask donors before moving anything.

Is my gift really matched?

Yes, up to €1.5 million, until 23:59 CEST on 31 August. The matching pot is held by the Fondation Lacaze and the running total is published daily.

Can I give goods instead?

Please don’t. Sorting and shipping donated clothing costs more than buying new locally, and the valley has no warehouse space left. Cash is genuinely more useful.