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Number of people confirmed dead rises to at least 72
The number of fatalities has risen to at least 72 people, government sources have told newspaper El País.
Several people remain missing. Rescue operations continue across southern and eastern Spain but have been hindered by downed power lines that have cut off electricity as well as collapsed phone networks and roads that remain impassable.
Key events
Sam Jones
The gratitude that greeted Tuesday’s dawn downpours was short-lived in Utiel. When the longed-for rains finally reached the town in the drought-stricken eastern Spanish region of Valencia, they were merciless in their abundance.
“People were very happy at first because they’d been praying for rain as their lands needed water,” said Remedios, who owns a bar in Utiel. “But by 12 o’clock, this storm had really hit and we were all pretty terrified.”
Trapped in the bar, she and a handful of her customers could only sit and watch as Spain’s worst flooding in almost 30 years caused the Magro River to overflow its banks, trapping some residents in their homes and sending cars and rubbish bins surging through the streets on muddy flood waters.
At least 120,000 people are without phone service in the Valencia region, Enrique Blanco of telecoms group Telefónica has told El País.
Other sources told the newspaper that the number of people without service could be as high as 200,000, given that other major phone operators in the region were also knocked out by the flash floods.
Ajit Niranjan
Residents of Chiva, a small town on the outskirts of Valencia, can expect a grim future of worsening drought as the planet heats up and the country dries out. But on Tuesday, they also witnessed a year’s worth of rainfall in a matter of hours.
The torrential rains that flooded southern and eastern Spain on Tuesday night, ripping away bridges and tearing through towns, have killed 64 people and counting. Fossil fuel pollution plays a role in warping both extremes of the water cycle: heat evaporates water, leaving people and plants parched, but hot air can hold more moisture, increasing the potential for catastrophic downpours.
The leader of the region of Andalusia, Juan Manuel Moreno Bonilla, has said that a 71-year-old man died in the floods, bringing the number of confirmed victims up to 73 people.
Moreno Bonilla did not offer further details, saying instead that the full impact of the storm was still to be determined.
‘I’m here by a miracle,’ says man caught in flash flood outside Valencia
Newspaper El País has spoken to Roberto, a 53-year-old who said he was driving last night near Xirivella, a municipality on the outskirts of Valencia, when the flash flood hit.
Cars started to stop, some turned around in the wrong direction, and we eventually came to a stop. The water started to rise and we climbed onto the hood of the car. We held on for more than four hours.
“And at almost 1 am we started walking home along the median. There were no lights, no police, no nothing. It was like a movie. The water was pouring down the road and we were two lanes away from the ramp that goes down to the river. I was panicked … I’m here by miracle.”
As we reported earlier, Spain’s prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, has addressed the nation, offering his condolences to those who have lost loved ones in the tragedy.
He added:
For those who at this moment are still looking for their loved ones, the whole of Spain weeps with you.”
My colleagues have put together this video with Sánchez’s remarks:
What we know so far:
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At least 72 people are now reported to have died after torrential rain battered eastern and southern Spain on Tuesday, bringing flash floods that raged through towns and cut off roads and railway lines.
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Spain has declared three days of mourning, beginning tomorrow.
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Rescuers continue to scour the floodwaters but Carlos Mazón, the regional leader of Valencia, said some areas remain “absolutely impossible” to reach.
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Government officials have said that the exact number of missing people remains unknown. “The fact that we can’t give a number of the missing persons indicates the magnitude of the tragedy,” said Spain’s minister of territory policies, Ángel Víctor Torres.
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While the rain has subsided in Valencia, weather officials have said parts of Catalonia and western Andalusia have been placed under maximum alert.
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Spain’s state weather agency has described the rainfall in parts of the country as “extraordinary,” with the small town of Chiva receiving practically as much rain as would be seen in a full year.
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The German government has offered its help to Spain, with a spokesperson adding they were in direct contact with Madrid should they need any assistance
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Climate scientists have warned that torrential rains are set to strengthen as the planet continues to heat up.
Emergency services continue to comb parts of eastern and southern Spain as government officials say that the exact number of missing people remains unknown.
Here are the latest photos coming to us from the wires:
Weather agency warns western Andalusia to brace for rain
Spain’s state weather agency has raised the level of alert for western Andalusia, warning of “intense rains” in the area.
Previously it had issued an amber alert for the area around Jerez, a city in Spain’s south.
On Wednesday afternoon, the country’s environment ministry said that the area was now under a red alert. “That is the maximum level,” it noted on social media, describing the risk of danger as “extreme.”
Videos posted on social media showed people struggling to make their way through the city’s streets as they battled a deluge of rushing, mud-coloured water.
Exact number of missing people remains unknown
Hours after parts of Spain were battered by torrential rains, rescue workers continue to frantically comb the devastated areas.
“We are facing a very difficult situation,” said Spain’s minister of territory policies, Ángel Víctor Torres. “The fact that we can’t give a number of the missing persons indicates the magnitude of the tragedy.”
The country’s defence minister, Margarita Robles, said more than 1,000 troops backed by helicopters were being deployed in the face of “an unprecedented phenomenon”.
Videos posted to social media showed police and rescue services using helicopters to lift people from their homes and rubber rafts to reach drivers stranded on top of cars.
Mayor in Valencia describes scene as ‘Dantesque’
The mayor of a small town in the region of Valencia has described the situation in her municipality as “Dantesque,” saying she had never seen anything like it in her life.
“This is a disaster,” Consuelo Tarazona, the mayor of Horno de Alcedo, told broadcaster RTVE.
“The whole town is flooded. Cars have been swept away, there’s a lorry in the middle of the highway. Walls have fallen, fences have fallen, everything has fallen.”
While nobody in her town of 1,300 had died or gone missing, “we went through a rough time,” she said.
“Firefighters were rescuing people from the water; families who were up to their necks in water,” she said. “The firefighters had to travel by dinghy, they couldn’t get through (the water) with their trucks.”
Though the rain had subsided, the municipality continued to reel from the consequences of the storm, she said.
“We still have a lot of water, we can’t get through,” she said. “We just had a fire in a paint factory and we’re dealing with toxic smoke … we received the emergency warning but never expected anything like this.”