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a crowd of volunteers are busy cleaning up the disaster-stricken towns near Valencia

Four days after the floods which devastated the south-east of the country, relief workers and volunteers are searching for the missing and working to restore the areas ravaged by the torrents of mud.

The dismal panorama of the night Tuesday October 29 to Wednesday October 30 gave way to spontaneous demonstrations of solidarity. Since the devastating floods which left at least 211 dead in the south-east of Spain, thousands of residents and volunteers have been mobilizing to help those affected.

Brooms and shovels in hand, they work to clean the streets of the affected towns, while emergency services are still looking for many missing people. On Saturday, Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez announced the reinforcement of 10,000 soldiers and police officers to participate in the search and help residents of the affected regions. According to the daily The Countrythis brings the number of members of the police mobilized to 18,000.

In every street of Paiporta, a martyred town of 25,000 inhabitants located south of Valencia, where dozens of deaths have been recorded, neighbors and volunteers tried to evacuate mountains of viscous mud. Everything is covered in brown and not a single building has been spared by the waves.

Thousands of volunteers left Valencia, whose city center was little affected by the floods, on foot to go to devastated neighboring towns. Their numbers are such that the authorities have called on them to stay at home. “It is imperative, imperative, that they return” so as not to hinder traffic, said the president of the Valencia region, Carlos Mazón, adding that he was considering restrictive measures “not only for vehicles, but also for pedestrians”.

In Massanassa, a village of 9,000 inhabitants, volunteers organize a human chain to remove the mud using buckets. (JOSE JORDAN / AFP)



Residents clean their homes in La Torre, near Valencia. (JOSE JORDAN / AFP)



In Algemesi, a village located south of Valencia, firefighters clean the streets. The water there rose up to 1.50 m. (FABIEN COTTEREAU / MAXPPP)



Volunteers clear mud from the bed of the Rambla del Poyo, a watercourse that runs through the town of Paiporta, south of Valencia. (JOSE JORDAN / AFP)



Debris is piled up in the middle of the street in Paiporta. (JOSE JORDAN / AFP)



Shovel in hand, a man cleans a street in Paiporta. (JOSE JORDAN / AFP)



Residents use plates to remove mud after floods in Paiporta. (JOSE JORDAN / AFP)



Volunteers scrape the floor of a flooded church in Paiporta. (JOSE JORDAN / AFP)



After sweeping a street in Paiporta, a person is covered in mud. (MANAURE QUINTERO / AFP)



Volunteers continue to gather on Saturday at the City of Arts and Sciences in Valencia before heading to the areas most affected by the floods. (JOSE JORDAN / AFP)



Army vehicles arrived as reinforcements on Friday, while above them, on a bridge, volunteers headed towards La Torre. (MANAURE QUINTERO / AFP)

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