Valencia: Spain declared mourning for at least 158 people on Thursday, and authorities asked people in flood-hit areas to stay home while rescuers raced to find survivors in the rare disaster.
An exceptionally strong Mediterranean storm since Tuesday has brought heavy rains and torrents of mud-filled water sweeping people away and destroying homes, with the eastern Valencia region being the worst affected.
The Valencia Region Rescue Work Coordination Authority announced that 155 bodies had been recovered there as of Thursday afternoon.
Officials in Castilla-La Mancha and Andalusia announced a combined three deaths in their regions on Wednesday.
With many people still missing and rescuers unable to reach some areas, government ministers warned that the initial toll of 95 announced Wednesday was likely to rise.
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez appealed: “Please stay at home… follow the calls of the emergency services.”
“The most important thing now is to save as many lives as possible,” Sanchez told residents of the eastern counties of Valencia and Castellón.
King Felipe VI warned that the state of emergency “is not over yet” and the national meteorological service (AEMET) put parts of the eastern and southern regions on high alert for rain on Thursday.
Flags were flown at half-mast on government buildings and minutes of silence were held across the country at the start of three days of national mourning following Spain’s deadliest floods in decades.
Elio Sanchez, a resident of a suburb of Valencia, recounted how violent currents kidnapped a man who tried to take refuge in a car.
“I was told of people who were clinging to trees, but the force forced them to let go and they were taken away, and they called for help. Trucks, everything was moving from here to there,” said Sanchez, 32.
‘disaster’
Emergency services backed by drones and more than 1,200 soldiers combed mud-filled towns and villages to find survivors and clear roads of debris.
Abandoned vehicles were stacked on top of each other like dominoes, and some residents grabbed planks of wood to plow through layers of thick, sticky mud. Agence France-Presse Reporters saw in the Valencia area.
In Bayporta, a suburb of Valencia that is at the epicenter of the damage, 27-year-old musician David Romero expressed his regret over the disaster.
“Neighborhood after neighborhood, street after street, there is no commercial standing,” he said. Agence France-Presse.
Hundreds of people are being housed in temporary accommodation while road and rail transport has been severely disrupted.
Transport Minister Oscar Puente wrote on X that it could take up to three weeks to reopen the high-speed line between Madrid and Valencia.
‘No one warned’
Scientists say human-induced climate change is increasing the length, frequency and intensity of extreme weather events that are increasingly unpredictable and difficult to control.
The political repercussions of the disaster began to emerge on Thursday after doubts were raised about the adequacy of warning systems.
Romero said the warnings in Bayporta only arrived when the local river was already overflowing and catching people off guard in the streets, a complaint echoed by 21-year-old Joaquin Rejon.
“Nobody warned of anything,” Reagon said. “They brought the bar owner out here dead, drowned, in disarray.” Agence France-Presse.
The conservative president of the Valencia region appeared to shift responsibility to the leftist central government on Wednesday.
But the Interior Ministry on Thursday criticized “misinformation” and said the regions, which have broad powers in Spain’s decentralized political system, are responsible for managing civil protection measures in emergency situations.