The weather forecast worked with DANA. Geologists, meteorologists and other climate and flood experts consulted by this newspaper are clear about this. But he red notice and orange for rain put in place by the State Meteorological Agency in advance of the tragedy did not prevent many people from leading a normal life. «We have not learned the alert system in society. When a red alert is issued you have to stay home. Surely we are going to have to reflect on this and change it,” summarizes Jorge Olcina, professor of Geography and director of the Climatology Laboratory at the University of Alicante.
Manuel Regueiro, president of the Illustrious Official College of Geologists (ICOG), expresses himself along the same lines. «This was warned. It is clear that people have not been cautious, perhaps they thought that water was going to fall but not so much,” he reflects. “We need more real awareness.”
The forecast from the State Meteorological Agency (Aemet) stated that 150 to 180 liters per square meter could be exceeded in 12-24 hours. “In that sense, in general, the forecasts adjusted to what happened,” says Rubén del Campo, spokesperson for the Aemet. The problem, explains geologist Andrés Díez, member of the research group on ‘Extreme Geological Events and Heritage’ of the IGME-CSIC, is that “even though the Aemet issued a warning and the media harassed us with the warnings, people continue living a normal life. And that’s because people don’t understand the phenomenon». Citizens do not know what those 180 liters per square meter imply, they do not visualize them. There is a lack of “risk education,” says the expert.
The meteorologist from eltiempo.es, Mar Gómez, also agrees. “The red level warning was well issued,” he explains, “but people don’t know what a red level warning entails or the measures they have to take. “We have to do much more exhaustive work to understand it.”
A ‘short’ memory
This lack of risk perception is partly contributed to by the fact that although there have always been floods in the Mediterranean area, it is difficult for the water to hit exactly the same place in a short period of time. Sometimes the flood takes a hundred years to return, but it always comes back. “In Levante there is a lot of urban population that has not experienced the DANAS of the rural population of the 50s and 60s, and they are not aware of the phenomenon,” explains Díez. “And the perception can only be had when they have suffered in their flesh.”
«The main thing is that We cannot leave everything in the hands of the authorities come save us. We have to develop our capacity for self-protection because no city council or autonomy has the capacity to rescue and save everyone,” Díez says.
The challenge is how to achieve this awareness. Regueiro is clear that it is necessary training in schools. Lives can be saved if children are taught from a young age not to go out into the street when faced with a serious warning, to seek refuge in high places or not to take the car, as they do with earthquakes in Japan.
Because the mapping of flood zones In Spain it has existed for years. «The flood risk maps are made. This is a problem of awareness,” insists Regueiro. One of the measures proposed by the expert is that houses that are built in flood-prone areas They pay very high insurance. «This is what happens in the United States, but it doesn’t happen here. “No one here analyzes that their house is in the bed of a river.”
A ‘black level’ alert
Olcina ventures the possibility of creating a ‘black level’ alert so that people know that their lives are at risk if they go out. “And we will have to activate the mobile notification system more importantly,” he says. Or implement systems like the one followed by the United States, where the National Guard prevents residents from leaving their homes. «Perhaps Civil Protection or State defense means are going to have to act in this way. Our Mediterranean phenomena are as intense as tropical systems, like hurricanes, and we are verifying it,” he says.
What doesn’t work, Díez points out, are the drills. «Our experience says that The drills are a disaster. “People act differently than they would in a disaster.” Nobody leaves the house in an orderly manner, turns off the electricity and gas and puts on a vest, for example. The important thing is to teach the population the attitude to follow. This is what they have been doing for years at the IGME with educational workshops for young peoplevideo games and intergenerational talks. “If you go down to save your pet in a flood, you lose points,” exemplifies the expert. Escalating this type of activities would be ideal, he believes.
It is a subject that should not be left behind, especially in a context of global increase in temperatures that favor humidity from the Mediterranean, the perfect fuel for superstorms. «Denialism takes human lives“This must be said clearly,” says Olcina, who indicates that “the way it rains in Spain is changing” and this has consequences. If before you had to wait between 15 and 20 years to have a historic DANA like the current one, now you only have to look back about five years to find storms like Gloria, which left Murcia and Alicante flooded.
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