In a few minutes, Flash floods Heavy rains in eastern Spain washed away almost everything in its path. People were trapped in vehicles, homes and businesses without time to react. Many people were killed and thousands of livelihoods were destroyed.
Four days later, authorities have recovered 213 bodies – most of them from the eastern Valencia region. They continued to search for an unknown number of missing people on Saturday (November 2, 3034).
Facing power and water cuts and shortages of some basic items, thousands of volunteers were helping remove thick layers of mud and debris that still covered homes, alleys and roads. Some vehicles piled up inside the water or crashed into buildings, with bodies still waiting to be identified.
Here are some things to know about Spain’s deadliest storm in living memory:
The storm was centered on the Magro and Turia river valleys and in the Poyo River bed, creating walls of water that overflowed the river banks, catching people unaware as they headed out on the evening of Tuesday (Oct. 29, 2024) and Wednesday (Oct. In the morning they continued with their daily lives. 30, 2024).
In the blink of an eye, muddy water covered roads, railways and entered homes and businesses in towns and villages on the southern outskirts of the city of Valencia. Drivers had to take shelter on car roofs, while residents took shelter on higher ground.
Spain’s national weather service said more rain fell in eight hours in the hard-hit area of Chiva than in the previous 20 months, calling the flooding “extraordinary”.
When authorities sent out alerts to mobile phones warning of the severity of the flooding and asking people to stay at home, many people were already on the streets, working or in low-lying areas or underground garages submerged in water. Which became a death trap.
Why did this terrible flood happen?
Scientists trying to explain what happened see two possible connections to human-caused climate change. One is that the hot air stops and then causes more rainfall. The second is potential changes in the jet stream – the river of air over land that moves weather systems around the world – that could lead to extreme weather.
“Climate scientists and meteorologists said the immediate cause of the flooding was a cut-off low-pressure storm system that originated from an unusually wavy and stalled jet stream. That system just stalled over this area and it started raining. It happens so often that in Spain they call them DANAs, which is the Spanish abbreviation of System,” the meteorologists said.
“And then there are the unusually high temperatures of the Mediterranean Sea. Its hottest surface temperature ever recorded was 28.47 degrees Celsius (83.25 degrees Fahrenheit) in mid-August,” said Carola Koenig of the Center for Flood Risk and Resilience at Brunel University London.
The extreme weather event comes as Spain faces prolonged drought in 2022 and 2023. Experts say drought and flood cycles are increasing with climate change.
Has this happened before?
Spain’s Mediterranean coast is accustomed to autumn storms that can cause flooding, but this event was the most powerful flash flooding event in recent memory.
Elderly people in Paporta, the epicenter of the tragedy, say Tuesday’s (October 29, 2024) flood was three times worse than the 1957 flood, which killed at least 81 people. That episode changed the course of the Turiya stream, which meant that a large part of the city was spared from the flood.
Valencia suffered two other major DANAs in the 1980s, one in 1982 with about 30 deaths, and another five years later that broke rainfall records.
The flash floods eclipsed those that swept away a camping site along the Gallego River in Biscas in the northeast in August 1996, killing 87 people.
What has been the state’s response?
Management of the crisis, classified by the Valencian government as level two on a scale of three, is in the hands of regional authorities, who can ask for help from the central government in mobilizing resources.
At the request of Valencia President Carlos Mazón of the conservative Popular Party, Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez on Saturday (November 2, 2024) announced the deployment of 5,000 more troops who will join rescue efforts, clear debris and distribute water and food. Will provide.
“The government will also send 5,000 more national police officers to the region,” Mr. Sanchez said.
Currently about 2,000 soldiers from the Military Emergency Unit, the army’s first intervention force for natural disasters and humanitarian crises, are involved in emergency work, along with about 2,500 Civil Guard gendarmes – who have rescued 4,500 people – and 1,800 National Police officers.
When many of those affected said they felt abandoned by the authorities, a wave of volunteers arrived to help. Carrying brooms, shovels, water and basic food items, hundreds of people walked for several kilometers to deliver supplies and help clean up the hardest-hit areas.
Mr Sanchez’s government is expected to approve a disaster declaration on Tuesday (October 29, 2024) that will allow quick access to financial aid. Mr Mazzone has announced additional economic support.
The Valencia regional government was criticized for not sending flood warnings to cellphones until 8 pm on Tuesday (October 29, 2024), when flooding had already begun in some places and after the national weather agency indicated heavy rain. Much after issuing the red alert.
published – November 03, 2024 08:36 am IST