A 64-year-old civilian who was invited as a back-seat passenger on a flight in a French air force Rafale fighter jet became so unsteadied by the g-force as his straps unloosened that he accidentally grabbed the ejector handle, rocketing him out of the aircraft when he parachuted – safely – to ground in north-east France, a probe into the incident has found.
French President Emmanuel Macron announced on Monday that the current national lockdown on public movement to contain the Covid-19 virus epidemic has been extended to May 11th, after which he forecast a gradual return to activity, while he also admitted that France had been insufficiently prepared for the health crisis.
Official figures released Saturday evening reported 635 deaths over the past 24 hours in France of people infected by the Covid-19 coronavirus, following a fall in the numbers that began on Friday, bringing the total number of fatalaties to 13,832 while the number of those infected by the virus who are receiving intensive care dropped to the lowest of the past week.
A party of seven men and three women of several nationalities who arrived from Britain in a chartered jet at Marseille-Provence airport, where helicopters were waiting to fly them on to a luxury villa in the Rivierra resort of Cannes, were told by airport police they were breaching regulations to contain the Cofid-19 virus epidemic and ordered to return to the UK.
The French aircarft carrier Charles de Gaulle is returning early from duty in the Atlantic Ocean to its Mediterranean base of Toulon after 50 of its crew tested positive to infection by the Covid-19 coronavirus, three of whom were evacuated from the ship by air.
Official figures announced by the French health authorities on Thursday showed a slight decrease in the number of patients being treated in intensive care in hospitals for the coronavirus Covid-19, while the total number number of recorded deaths this year from the virus rose to 12,210.
The governor of France's central bank has announced that gross domestic product (GDP) shrank by an estimated 6 percent in the first quarter of 2020 due to measures to contain the spread of Covid-19, the worse single-quarter economic performance since the end of the Second World War in 1945.
Six weeks' of recordings of around 7,000 hours of the entire Gregorian repertoire recorded by US musician John Anderson in the abbey church of Notre-Dame de Fidélité de Jouques, near the town of Aix-en-Provence in southern France, have been released online for Easter celebrations after lockdown measures prevented worshippers from physically attending celebrations this weekend.
French social sciences researcher Roland Marchal, 64, who was released by Iran in a prisoner exchange last month after spending nine months in jail on spying charges, has described the harsh conditions of isolation he was held in after his arrest and that of fellow researcher Fariba Adelkhah, who remains in a Tehran prison.
Latest official figures released on Tuesday of the Covid-19 virus toll in France reported 607 deaths in hospitals over the preceeding 24 hours, and a further 802 fatalities in care homes, bringing the overall numbers of those who have died in the epidemic since March 1st to 10,328.
