Forty-one.

That’s how many Paris metro stations would need to be shut down in the event the Seine River rises to the levels of the Great Flood of 1910 today.

Without effective waterway management or reservoirs, this kind of flooding could cause approximately 30 billion Euro in damages, not to mention the lasting economic and ecological impact it would have on the city and its surroundings.

Enter Opération Sequana, or EU Sequana 2016 (see sidebar), a major effort to simulate the effects of a rise of the Seine to the levels of a centennial flood like that of 1910. It involves almost every major organization in the Île-de-France region (see map) of Paris, including AXA Group, AXA France and all the entities operating in the area.

41 metro stations… 30 billion Euro…

Where do these numbers come from?