King Felipe VI and Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez are traveling to southeastern Spain on Sunday, where new heavy rains are expected after incredibly violent floods that left at least 213 dead.
Five days after this bad weather, which caused the worst natural disaster in the country’s history according to the government, searches continue to find the missing, clear the roads and restore the infrastructure destroyed by the torrents of mud.
“We are facing the challenge of our lives but we will find the solutions,” assured Saturday the conservative president of the Valencia region, Carlos Mazón, criticized for having sent a late telephone alert message to residents Tuesday evening, while the meteorological services had placed the region on “red alert” in the morning.
Mazón will be present on Sunday alongside Pedro Sánchez, Felipe VI and Queen Letizia, who are due to visit the “affected areas” by the floods. The program of their visit has not yet been made public but according to Spanish media, they could go to Chiva and Paiporta, two of the most affected localities.
Their visit comes as the Spanish meteorological agency (Aemet) has issued a new orange alert for heavy rains in the Valencia region, particularly in the Valencian conurbation, where 100 liters of water per square meter (i.e. 10 cm).
A red alert has also been issued for the province of Almeria, in Andalusia (south), due to “torrential rains” likely to cause “floods”, according to Aemet, which recommends that residents only travel ‘in case of “strict necessity”.
– “We are looking for answers” –
According to the latest report released on Saturday evening by the authorities, 213 people died due to the floods. The vast majority of them (210) died in the Valencia region, with two other victims having been reported in Castile-la-Mancha and a third in Andalusia.
Authorities expect the toll to rise as car wrecks piled up in tunnels and underground parking lots in the worst-hit areas are now methodically examined. The exact number of missing people remains unknown at this stage.
On the ground, the population remains faced with a complicated situation, due to the damage caused by bad weather to transport and telecommunications infrastructure. In many communities, piles of mud-covered cars and debris remain on the roadways.
“We’ve been cleaning for three days. Everything is covered in mud,” Helena Danna Daniella, owner of a bar-restaurant in Chiva, a town of 17,000 inhabitants west of Valencia, among the most affected by the floods, told an AFP journalist.
“It feels like the end of the world,” adds this thirty-year-old, who says she is still in shock five days after the bad weather. People trapped in raging waves “were asking for help and there was nothing we could do (…) It drives you crazy. We look for answers and we don’t find them.”
– New arrests –
Faced with this chaotic situation, Mr. Sanchez announced on Saturday the sending of 5,000 additional soldiers to the region, bringing their total strength to 7,500, the “largest deployment of armed forces ever carried out in Spain in peacetime”, according to him.
To these soldiers will be added 5,000 police officers and civil guards responsible for supporting their 5,000 colleagues already on the ground. An amphibious ship from the Spanish Navy including operating theaters is also expected in the port of Valencia.
According to the police, around twenty new arrests also took place on Saturday evening for acts of theft and looting. Offenses denounced by the authorities, who promised to restore order.
“There are people who may have felt alone, helpless, unprotected,” Mr. Mazón admitted on Saturday evening. But “I want to send a clear message, we are going to help all the households,” he added, emphasizing the “spirit of solidarity” of the residents.
Friday and Saturday, thousands of them went on foot to the most affected communities with shovels and brooms, in order to help those affected. These movements have in some places hampered emergency services by blocking the roads.
This situation has led the authorities to limit access to certain localities. The Valencia government thus limited the number of volunteers authorized to go to the southern suburbs of the city to 2,000 on Sunday and restricted access to 12 localities.
