3️⃣ : Des milliers de litres de #vin déversés dans les rues de #Setehttps://t.co/lBjXmPixZK#WineMorning🍷⚡️ pic.twitter.com/VRDMfV88qA
— Rhonéa (@RhoneaOfficiel) August 3, 2016
On Tuesday night, residents of Sète, a small town in the South of France, woke suddenly. Sirens blared, and fire engines careered around the corners. People climbed from their beds to peer out of their windows, only to see the streets literally running red. It was a nightmare... or was it a dream? Block after block, the streets had been flooded with red wine.
"The plonk flooded into local basements, car parks, and even some people's homes," the Local reports. (For non-Europeans: plonk means, essentially, "cheap wine.") The wine was all from Biron, a local distributor. Midi Libre adds that it was "very fragrant."
Emergency services cleaned it the scene up quickly. But the perpetrators remained a mystery until Wednesday morning, when they proudly came forward. It was the work of the Comité Régional d'Action Viticole, or CRAV—a "radical group of wine producers" who are upset about the recent influx of cheap foreign stuff.
CRAV have committed a number of crimes, many of which were much less silly—they have bombed buildings, hijacked trucks, and taken credit for the deaths of two vineyard mavens, who died in a helicopter crash.
This time, the only victims were Biron—which lost over 13,000 gallons of wine—and whoever's car now smells like Pinot forever.
Every day, we track down a fleeting wonder—something amazing that's only happening right now. Have a tip for us? Tell us about it! Send your temporary miracles to cara@atlasobscura.com.