Flora Benoît, originally from Ain, crossed a physalie in the water in Saint-Jean-de-Luz. “We quickly got out. We saw a surfer getting bit bitten and even the lifeguard who was fishing for it! We are careful but it will not spoil our vacation. »»
“When there is a danger, our only option is to prevent people from swimming”
“We know that in Australia with the ‘Bluebottles’, it looks like physalies, they are blue and smaller. I’ve been stinging, it hurts but ‘That’s Life!’, “Adds Jason Speck, another tourist.
“Fights”
“We had sent our jet ski in location, we knew that a bench was going to happen, it did not fail,” explains Peyo Peyreblanque, head of the Uhabia rescue post.
It is he who decides to temporarily hoist the red flag. “When you have an influx of five-six injured, you cannot both treat them and ensure surveillance in the water. And when there is a danger, our only option is to prevent people from swimming. »»
The injuries are not treated lightly. “They are impressive, like big lashes. Among some, it paralyzes the muscle, ”underlines the firefighter.
What care?
The treatments consist in rubbing the wound with wet sand, rinse with salt water and then apply shaving foam. The filament residues are scraped with a wooden spatula and the skin washed finally with vineyard water. The wounded is kept 30 minutes under surveillance.
Service chef from the anti-poison center at the Bordeaux University Hospital, Dr. Magali Oliva-Labadie has changed this protocol since a recent study in Spain, where the beast also rages, has proven the effectiveness of vinegar to limit enforcement.
Risks of complications
According to her own research, carried out after influx of physalies in 2008 and 2010, the doctor believes that serious complications – muscle tetania, even respiratory distress, which can lead to drowning – occur “in 8 to 10 % of cases”.
Seven out of ten patients describe very strong pain, for some “worse than a childhood without epidural or a nephretic colic”. But it does not last long, generally one to two hours.
In recent weeks, “four-five” serious cases-without respiratory distress-have occurred on the Aquitaine coast, according to Dr Oliva-Labadie.
In the Landes, several people went to the hospital but “it was mainly to manage pain,” said Stéphanie Barneix, project manager at the mixed union (SMGBL) who oversees 35 rescue stations over 106 km of coast.
The physalies concern “all south of the Gulf of Gascogne, from the Asturias in Spain to the north of the Landes”, underlines Elvire Antajan, researcher at Ifremer, for whom the current episode has “nothing exceptional”.
Hot and winds
Physalies live in the tropical waters of the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico and follow the hot currents of the Gulf Stream. Usually confined offshore, they were “folded down” by strong winds between the end of June and mid-July, explains the specialist.
The animal is poorly known, in particular its reproduction cycle, while the presence of many juvenile physalies, the size of an inch, surprises this year. Difficult, also, to anticipate their trajectory and their arrival on the beaches.
Warm warming, which benefits the jellyfish, explains the massive presence of physalies? “It is far too early to say,” replies Elvire Antajan, “we should study the recurrence of the winds which reduce them on the coasts and be able to establish a link with the disruption of the climate”.
The weather for the next few days could turn in favor of bathers, with winds likely to keep physalies away.
