has damaged over 3,000 hectares of vineyard in Burgundy, extending from Nuits-Saint-Georges to Mâcon.Though the storm only lasted for about 10 minutes, it is estimated by the Confédération des Appellations et des Vignerons de Bourgogne that it will cost the region's winemakers €75 million.
Up to 90 per cent of plants were ruined in the worst-affected areas. The prestigious estate of Joseph Voillot, which accounts for appellations such as Volnay, Pommard and Beaune, has seen somewhere between 40 per cent and 80 per cent of its crops destroyed by the vicious hail. Other crus, such as Auxey-Duresses, Corton and Puligny-Montrachet will also have harvests well below what was anticipated.
“It’s a catastrophe,” said Jean-Louis Moissenet, the president of the Pommard winemakers’ association. “We were heading for a good year, but now that has fallen through.”
After last summer’s hailstorms in the region, which ruined around 60 per cent of the crop, winemakers installed more than 30 cannons on their land which shoot silver iodide into the atmosphere. This is supposed to dissolve the hailstones and turn them into rain.
The cannons had been switched on by Saturday morning following a weather alert but failed to prevent the damage.
