Evelyne Dhéliat, like a hurricane – Liberation

At the forefront of climate change, the popular TF1 weather presenter sees herself as a link between scientists and the general public.

Like an actress before the curtain goes up, she clears her throat, articulates a few syllables. The counter scrolls before the live. Evelyne Dhéliat takes a last look in a pocket mirror, discreetly readjusts a lock. “Two minutes”, warns the assistant. The presenter, in a sixties dress and patent heels, whispers to herself: “Come on, let’s focus.” Even before the jingle, an exaggerated smile stretches across his face. The movements, fluid, follow one another on the green background, like a well-honed choreography. In a confident tone, it unfolds without a hitch: thick fog in the North, heat in the Southwest. End clap, timing respected. The performance lasted two minutes ten. It is in this studio of TF1, that of the television news, that the voluble and considerate septuagenarian – the type to ensure that the visitor does not “don’t break the margoulette” on camera tracks – records his bulletin twice a day.

In this early fall, no destructive floods or threatening storms. A fragile but deserved respite. Evelyne Dhéliat has spent the last few months setting temperature records, detailing vigilance maps, watching for the next heat wave. “We are in a gear…” slice the cathodic figure, incarnation of the weather on the private channel for three decades, during which she could only see the intensification and multiplication of extreme events.

At …