New data continues to appear in dribs and drabs of the contradictory versions between the central Government and the Generalitat about what happened last Tuesday, October 29 in the meeting room of the Integrated Operational Coordination Center (CECOPI) summoned by the DANA that devastated part of the province of Valencia. Now it has been the Ministry for the Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge who has revealed that it warned before 5:30 p.m. of the probability of Forata dam break and that the body constituted by the regional Executive did not make any decision between 5:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m. on that fateful afternoon.
According to sources from the department led by Third Vice President Teresa Ribera, Cecopi, under the leadership of the Minister of Justice and Interior, Salomé Pradas, did not adopt any measures during its first two hours of operation and even suspended the meeting between 6:00 p.m. and 7:00 p.m.despite the fact that the hydrological alerts for overflowing of the Poyo ravine, Magro river, Júcar river and the Forata dam by 112 were already known. “They turned off the video call screens,” they criticize.
A “very serious” situation as described by the experts from the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet), present throughout the afternoon of Tuesday in which the flood swept away dozens of towns and killed 217 people in Valencia. . Such was the scope of what was happening that the same sources emphasize that the reasons for activating the ES-Alert system They were already on the table before 6:00 p.m.
According to this version of events, Aemet and the Government differentiate three phases in the Cecopi emergency room. The first, from 5:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m., when the seriousness of the situation began to be raised and the probability of the Forata dam breaking was even alerted and the eviction of the population from the area; the second, a one-hour break in the meeting and the third starting at 7:00 p.m., when the president of the Generalitat, Carlos Mazón, joined half an hour later.
Around 7:10 p.m., still without the leader of the regional Executive in the technical center of l’Eliana, was when discussions began, according to Aemet, about the possibility of launching the ES-Alert alarm to the population and the options for send a message of confinement, recommend going to the upper floors of buildings, prohibit circulation or issue some recommendations regarding this. Finally, The massive alert was sent at 8:11 p.m. that day.
Aemet’s clarification comes after President Mazón stated during his appearance in the Valencian Cortes that the “imminent” risk in Forata was the reason for using Es-Alert for the first time and it was activated after the Secretary of State for the Environment, Hugo Morán, reported from Colombia that perhaps the dam was not capable of resisting the onslaught of water. In fact, the ‘popular’ leader stated that he went to Cecopi when he learned that the infrastructure’s retaining walls were in danger.
In parallel, the State Meteorological Agency has tried to deny another of the accusations verbalized by the Valencian president in parliamentary headquarters regarding
#Government #maintains #warned #risk #Forata #dam #breaking #p.m
