At 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, October 29, 2024, 1,000 cubic meters per second of water were flowing down the well-known Poyo ravine. This amount is twice the usual flow of the Ebro River, the largest in Spain. At that time, the current of mud, stones, reeds and everything in its path had already devastated Chiva, 30 kilometers from the municipalities of Paiporta, Torrent, Alfafar, Alaquàs, Picanya or Sedaví. The night before, DANA had flooded Utiel and Requena and, during the morning, impressive rainfall of up to 500 liters per square meter in a few hours had flooded the municipalities on the banks of the Júcar and Turia. At noon on that fateful Tuesday, the first alerts of missing persons began to arrive and a tornado had even crossed Carlet and the A-7 highway, the Mediterranean corridor through which 40% of Spanish goods circulate.
The AEMET had decreed the red alert at 7 in the morning and the media and networks warned of the seriousness of the situation with photos and videos that will remain in the disastrous memory of Valencians. While all this was happening, the president of the Valencian Generalitat, Carlos Mazón, continued with his political agenda and attended three official events during the morning. Even at 1 p.m. on Tuesday, October 29, in a public appearance he assured that the DANA was going to move away and the storm would subside at 6 p.m. At 5 p.m., the Minister of Justice, Salomé Pradas, convened the Integrated Operational Coordination Center (Cecopi), chaired by Pradas herself. With the meeting started, President Mazón attended, to whom the attendees had to report all the data again. Fact that delayed the meeting. At 6:30 p.m., 2,000 cubic meters per second of angry water were already flowing down the Poyo ravine and bridges and roads were beginning to fall, swept away by mud and rocks. It was not until 8:12 p.m. that all Valencians, the majority with water up to their necks or with their towns already destroyed, received the personalized alert SMS that warned that any type of mobility could be lethal. The Valencia Provincial Council had sent its workers home at 2 p.m. “due to very high risk for the population.”
The consequences of the historic DANA and the slow response of the autonomous administration that was in charge have already begun to be known. At the close of this edition, the number of people killed by overflows and ravines amounted to 211, the vast majority in the regions of Valencia, but also in Castilla-La Mancha. The number of missing people, which the administration has kept secret so as not to further alarm the population, is reliably unknown, so the number of victims will not stop growing. Monday night, October 28, and Tuesday, October 29, were two devastating days. But it was on Wednesday morning the 30th, when the population woke up, that the magnitude of the catastrophe was confirmed. Hundreds of people had to sleep outdoors, on rooftops, in the homes of acquaintances or strangers who had taken them in, in their factories or even in a cinema. Where the DANA and the ravines surprised them. The images that the media and social networks began to publish showed an unprecedented catastrophe. Thousands of destroyed cars, flooded homes and basements, destroyed factories and infrastructure and death, above all, death.
The final number of deaths is still unknown, but so is the economic damage. It has just started counting. Individuals have lost their homes, their vehicles and, in many cases, the place to go to work. The Mediterranean corridor is cut off, the A3 that connects Madrid and Valencia is also closed, the AVE and suburban trains in the province of Valencia cannot be used in many points and dozens of sections of roads and bridges will have to be demolished to be rebuilt.
Wednesday, October 30, was the day of stupefaction. The day of perplexity. The day of indignation. The thousands of people in the affected municipalities were helpless in the face of the seriousness of the situation. Emergency teams continued with the rescue tasks that had begun in the early hours of Monday and Tuesday and continued throughout the day. First the living and wounded, then the dead. The City of Justice set up offices at the Institute of Legal Medicine to carry out the autopsies but, after a few hours, it became too small and it was decided to transfer the bodies to Feria Valencia.
The testimonies of pain are countless. Like Patricia’s: “We got out of the car and saw that a waterspout was coming. We were on the road closest to the new channel, but the part that was next to the urban areas began to flood and the cars to float, so people jumped over the median to come to where we were. But the water began to pass by us and then we walked to a truck, where the trucker opened the trailer for us and we were able to get in. We were about 30 people, with children and six babies.” Or Antonio’s: “There were many people on top of the cars and trucks. A girl standing on a pole. The current ripped off my clothes when I was clinging to the fence. I couldn’t move. I started screaming because I saw that I wasn’t going to last. I didn’t want to die. “The car went down the ravine.” And many other dramatic cases that relate the situation of ignorance and mortal danger that stalked them for hours. Also the saddest stories, like the six supermarket employees who were found dead in the store when the water level dropped. The six elderly people from a residence who could not be evacuated and perished underwater, or the man who was trapped in the elevator and drowned when he went down to the basement to rescue his car. The flooded basements and basements have claimed dozens of victims.
On Thursday, October 31, the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, recently landed from India, went to Valencia. Sánchez met with Mazón and all the institutions present at Cecopi. The president announced all the support of the Government, which he certified in an institutional appearance from the Moncloa last Saturday. The Army will assign 5,000 troops to the devastated areas to help clean up and clear debris. Previously, it had been the Military Emergency Unit that had been deployed to rescue people, first, and to help search for bodies. Civil Guard, national police and local police, as well as firefighters, were waist-deep in mud locating bodies. These days, the mayors of the most affected municipalities have been the voice of their neighbors. All of them, from the PP of the PSPV-PSOE, have denounced the lack of information, coordination and support from the Generalitat. They have also missed resources and logistical support.
On Friday, November 1, All Saints’ Day and a holiday throughout Spain, the flood of solidarity came. Once again, people gave their best and worst version in a catastrophe. While the police arrested a hundred people for stealing from supermarkets and businesses devastated by the flood, tens of thousands of people from all over Spain showed up in all the affected municipalities to help with the cleaning and debris removal tasks. Meanwhile, the search for bodies continued and the numbers continued to increase. The flood of volunteers has been such that on Saturday, November 2, the Generalitat had to organize buses in the City of Arts and Sciences to properly manage the desire for collaboration. On Saturday morning alone, more than 10,000 volunteers showed up at the scheduled location at 7 a.m.
As has happened throughout the management of the disaster, lack of coordination has been the trend. Lack of buses to meet the demand, doubtfully selected destinations and complaints from volunteers. Despite everything, resources have been reaching the municipalities. Starting this Saturday, 5,000 soldiers will collaborate in the actions of water drainage, cleaning, debris removal and mud removal.
Meanwhile, the search for the missing continues and, unfortunately, will continue in the coming days and weeks. The mud has buried many bodies and the water has dragged them to the sea. For their part, hospitals are already beginning to notice symptoms of collapse due to the large number of injured people, many of them with infections caused by stagnant water. This is the new challenge to address. The humanitarian crisis.
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