A minister in Aveyron, the miracle of 2025, the comet in the Gard sky… the essential news in the region

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A comet that makes the front page

#GARD – Based in Saint-Chaptes, a long-time resident of Montpellier, a city where he participated in the discussions for what would become the Odysseum planetarium, astronomer and astrophysicist Jean-Michel Faidit is honored by Planetarian, a magazine published by the International Planetarium Society since 1972. A photo of the Tsuchinshan-Atlas comet in the sky of Gard earned him the front page of this leading magazine for planetariums worldwide for the fourth time. Previously for articles, there, “it's with a celestial photograph that I took and it's really nice”, he shares.

Today's figure: 332

#LOZERE – This is the number of births at the Mende maternity ward in 2024. A figure that is falling, as in the rest of France. “We have noticed that there are more transfers to university hospitals”, notes Gretel Grimal, a maternity manager. We are also seeing an increase in home births, whether unexpected or chosen. The maternity ward can boast of not having closed a single day in 2024. A rare case in Occitanie (excluding university hospitals). In 2024, the department welcomed two doctors who graduated abroad.

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A miracle survivor after a 200-meter fall in the mountains

#GARD – “This is the miracle survivor of the end of the year”, says Jean-François. On December 29, 2024, his son, Michel Rognon, 36, suffered a dizzying fall from the Aneto peak, at 3,404 meters in the Spanish Pyrenees. “I climbed the Vignemale, the Canigou, the Carlit. There, I wanted to bivouac on the Aneto pass. To reassure my mother, I decided not to do it alone…”, he explains. With a friend, they take up the challenge. But on the way down, to catch his down jacket, Michel falls. According to his smartwatch, he fell 200 m at a speed of 35.4 km/h. His friend manages to alert the emergency services. Michel Rognon will be airlifted to a hospital in Spain and then transferred to Montpellier. “I was lucky”, admits Michel, who gets away with a month of convalescence.

The Minister of Labor in Aveyron

#VISIT– It is the Prime Minister of the new Bayrou government who is traveling to Aveyron. Astrid Panosyan-Bouvet, in charge of Labor and Employment, who wants to increase her field trips, chose Aveyron as one of her first destinations on Wednesday, January 8 and Thursday, January 9, 2025. Not necessarily by chance. Because among the files on the table on Rue de Grenelle is that of the generalization of the RSA system. Aveyron is one of the first departments to have participated in the experiment of supporting RSA beneficiaries in 2023, generalized to the entire French territory since January 1, 2025. “More than a year after its launch, the milestones set by France Travail are bearing fruit. In fact, in terms of the number of beneficiaries, we can see a significant drop in the number of people supported under an integration contract, down 11% between December 2022 and December 2023”, comments the Aveyron Department.

A monumental funeral

#MONTPELLIER – Georges Frêche and Louis Nicollin were treated to Saint-Pierre Cathedral. For Michel Fromont, Monday, January 6, 2025, it was Zénith Sud and Parc des Expositions. But who was Michel Fromont ? Undoubtedly one of the most influential people in Montpellier. He liked to define himself as a plumber. A plumber entrepreneur whose first stepping stone was to chair the plumbers of Hérault, then the commercial court, the construction federation, the CCI, the airport supervisory board. Missions for which he received the National Order of Merit and the Legion of Honor. In 2009, he created the Cercle Mozart which brings together the Montpellier business world. On Monday, everyone praised this man “who loved people, who helped people”.

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