An unknown number of people are still missing and more victims could be found.
“Unfortunately, there are dead people in some vehicles,” Spanish Transport Minister Óscar Puente said early on Thursday, before the death toll rose to 95 on Wednesday evening.
The rushing water turned narrow streets into death traps and spawned rivers that tore through homes and businesses, sweeping away cars, people and everything else in its path. The floods destroyed bridges and left muddy tracks where roads once were. Roads are unrecognizable.
Luís Sánchez, a welder, said he rescued several people trapped in their cars on the flooded V-31 highway south of the city of Valencia. The road quickly became a floating graveyard, littered with hundreds of vehicles.
“I saw bodies floating by. I shouted, but nothing,” Sánchez said. “The fire brigade first took the elderly with them when they could enter. I’m from the area, so I tried to help and save people. People were crying everywhere, they were stuck.”
Regional authorities said late Wednesday that rescuers in helicopters had rescued about 70 people stranded on rooftops and in cars, but ground crews were far from finished.
“We are searching house by house,” Ángel Martínez, one of 1,000 soldiers helping with rescue efforts, told Spanish national radio RNE from the town of Utiel, where at least six people were killed.
An Associated Press journalist watched rescuers remove seven body bags from an underground garage in Barrio de la Torre.
“Our priority is to find the victims and the missing so that we can help end the suffering of their families,” Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said on Thursday after meeting with officials and emergency services in Valencia, the first of three official days of mourning.
People walk in an area affected by flooding in Valencia, Spain on October 31.Manu Fernandez/Associated Press
Spain’s Mediterranean coast is used to autumn storms that can cause flooding, but this was the most powerful flash flood in recent history. Scientists link it to climate change, which is also responsible for increasing temperatures and droughts in Spain and the warming of the Mediterranean Sea.
Man-made climate change has doubled the chance of a storm like this week’s deluge in Valencia, according to a quick but partial analysis Thursday by World Weather Attribution, made up of dozens of international scientists who study the role of global warming in extreme weather. study.
Spain has suffered a nearly two-year drought, meaning that when the deluge occurred late Tuesday and early Wednesday, the ground was so hard that it could not absorb the rain, leading to flash flooding.
The violent weather took regional government officials by surprise. Spain’s national weather service said it rained more in eight hours in the Valencian city of Chiva than in the previous 20 months.
A man cried as he showed a reporter from national broadcaster RTVE the shell of what was once the ground floor of his home in Catarroja, south of Valencia. It looked like a bomb had exploded inside, destroying furniture and belongings and stripping paint from some walls.
In Paiporta, Mayor Maribel Albalat said on Thursday that at least 62 people had died in the community of 25,000 people next to the city of Valencia.
“(Paiporta) never has floods, we never have these kinds of problems. And we found many elderly people in the city center,” Albalat told RTVE. “There were also a lot of people coming to get their cars out of their garages… it was a real trap.”
While most suffering was inflicted on municipalities near the city of Valencia, the storms unleashed their fury across vast swaths of the southern and eastern coasts of the Iberian Peninsula. Two fatalities were confirmed in the neighboring region of Castilla La Mancha and one in southern Andalusia.
Greenhouses and farms across southern Spain, known as the European Garden because of its exported produce, were also devastated by heavy rains and flooding. The storms caused a bizarre tornado in Valencia and a hail storm that punched holes in cars in Andalusia. Houses were without water as far south as Malaga, in Andalusia.
The heavy rain continued further north on Thursday as the Spanish weather agency issued warnings for several provinces in Castellón, in the eastern Valencia region, and for Tarragona in Catalonia, as well as for southwestern Cadiz.
“This storm front is still with us,” the prime minister said. “Stay at home and follow the official recommendation and you will help save lives.”
People walk along the road after leaving their homes inundated by the floods in Paiporta, near Valencia, Spain, on October 30.Alberto Saiz/Associated Press
Frustration arises as residents look for basic amenities
As the shock wore off, anger grew over the authorities’ handling of the crisis, both due to their late warnings of the impending floods and the chaotic aid response.
Many survivors had to walk long distances in sticky mud to find food and water. Most of their cars were destroyed and the mud, destruction and debris left by the storm made some roads impassable. Some pushed shopping carts through the rain-soaked streets, while others carried their children to keep them out of the mud.
About 150,000 people in Valencia were without electricity on Wednesday, but about half had electricity on Thursday. An unknown number had no running water and relied on whatever bottled water they could find.
The region remained partially isolated with several roads cut and train lines interrupted, including the high-speed service to Madrid. Officials said it would take two to three weeks to repair the damaged line.
And while rescue personnel focused on recovering the dead, survivors had to find basic supplies and clean up the mess. Volunteers helped locals move wrecked vehicles, remove debris and sweep up mud.
With local services clearly overwhelmed, Carlos Mazón, the regional president of Valencia, asked on Thursday whether the Spanish army could help distribute basic goods to the population. The government in Madrid responded by promising to send another 500 soldiers, more national police and vigilantes.
But necessity – and the post-apocalyptic atmosphere – led some to enter abandoned shops.
The National Police arrested 39 people on Wednesday for looting. The Guardia Civil said it has arrested 11 people for thefts in shopping centres, while officers have also been deployed to stop people stealing from cars.
Some people said they had to steal supplies, especially those without running water or a way to get to stores that weren’t destroyed.
“We are not thieves. I work as a cleaner at the school for the municipality. But we have to eat. Look what I’m picking up: baby food for the baby,” said Nieves Vargas at a local supermarket whose doors had been swept aside by water and unattended by staff. “What can I give the child if we don’t have electricity.”
Wilson reported from Barcelona, Spain, and Leon reported from Valencia. Teresa Medrano in Madrid and Seth Borenstein in Washington, DC, contributed.