Paris remained on flood alert Saturday after the swollen River Seine burst its banks, leaving streets flooded and forcing one wing of the famous Louvre Museum to close.
The Seine burst its banks this week when water levels reached just over 5 meters (17 feet).
There were fears the water could peak at 6.2 meters Saturday, but after it stopped raining Friday, the French meteorological service Meteo France said that was unlikely.
The peak is forecast to be between 5.8 and 6 meters over the weekend, according to CNN’s French affiliate BFMTV. That’s lower than the last serious flooding in June 2016, when water levels reached 6.1 meters and riverside museums were forced to move artwork from their basements.
Water levels by the central Austerlitz bridge had reached 5.7 meters Saturday morning, according to the official Vigicrues flood monitoring website.
Flooding has disrupted some metro and train services in the city, and some walkways and roads near the river are closed.
Aerial footage filmed by a Paris police department drone and posted on Twitter shows the extent of the flooding.
The Louvre, which is next to the river, partially closed one wing as a cautionary measure. Louvre officials told CNN that the museum expects the lower level of the Islamic wing to remain closed until at least Monday and they have protocols in place to protect valuable artworks should the situation deteriorate.
Parisians were nevertheless unfazed, saying the deluge had not impacted their daily lives too much.
Water levels in the rain-swollen Seine are nowhere near those reached in 1910, when waters rose to more than 28 feet, forcing residents to evacuate.
Colombe Brossel, the deputy Paris mayor, told CNN the city had learned from past mistakes, but that more needs to be done to adapt to climate change.
“Two floodings of the Seine river in less than two years — we have to change, we have to change the way we build this city,” Brossel said. “We have to understand that climatic change is not a word, it’s a reality.”
South of the capital, the Seine has been more punishing in the suburb of Conde-Sainte-Libiaire, where residents were evacuated as roads turned into rivers and homes were left almost submerged.