Just like Spain, where floods in the Valencia region caused the death of more than 200 people, France and its development are very vulnerable to flood risk. The cause is urbanization and concreting which developed in the 20th century, particularly in flood-prone areas. Today, more than one in four French people live in such an area.
Neighborhoods swept away, vehicles piled up, fields and homes devastated… In the east of Spain, the entire Valencia region was disfigured by floods, after torrential rains fell on the night of Tuesday 29 to Wednesday October 30. Like the material damage, the human toll is catastrophic: 205 people have died, according to a final count carried out this Saturday, November 2, and dozens of others are still missing.
The cause, in particular, is the artificialization of soils and the rampant concretization of the region which has lost, in around fifty years, two thirds of its orchards, as reported on the Horta region website. However, by preventing water from seeping into the ground, urbanization has made the metropolis more vulnerable to extreme weather phenomena. Today, 500,000 people live in flood zones around Valencia.
France
