Death Toll in Storm Adam Flooding in Eastern Spain Rises to Four: Up to 700 Litres of Rain in 24 Hours in Parts of Valencia, More Than 400 Rescues Carried Out
Madrid — Four people have been killed as torrential rainfall sweeping eastern Spain triggered severe flooding, evacuations and shelter-in-place orders for tens of thousands of people, authorities said on Monday, AFP and Al Jazeera reported. The downpour from Storm Adam, which started on Saturday, dumped as much as 700 litres of rain (185 gallons) per square metre in 24 hours in some areas of the Valencia region, Al Jazeera reported. Xinhua reported accumulations of more than 600 liters per square meter in parts of the Valencia region.
Authorities confirmed four deaths linked to the storm. Two people died in the coastal resort town of Oliva: a 79-year-old woman was found dead at her home, and a 64-year-old man died of a heart attack at a campsite in the same municipality, according to Xinhua. Another victim was killed at a beach in Sagunto, and a fourth drowned after falling into a swollen stream in Catalonia — a woman swept away by rising floodwaters in northern Barcelona on Saturday evening, whose body was discovered on Sunday morning, Xinhua reported.
Videos released by Valencia's regional meteorological agency showed streets turned into torrents, sweeping away vehicles in several towns in the provinces of Valencia and Alicante. "Road travel is impossible, you must stay at home," Juan Carlos Valderrama, the Valencia region's emergency chief, said on Monday morning, warning that intense and persistent rainfall was causing severe flooding. Emergency services and soldiers from Spain's military emergency response unit were working early on Monday to evacuate people whose homes had flooded, including residents who had taken refuge on rooftops. According to government representative Pilar Bernabé, security forces carried out more than 400 rescues in the Valencia region, with some stranded residents winched to safety from rooftops, Al Jazeera reported. Emergency services have responded to over 700 incidents across the Valencia region, schools have been closed, and floodwaters have made numerous roads impassable, according to Xinhua.
"Rescue operations are continuing in areas that are difficult to access. People are urged to avoid all travel," Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said on X, describing the situation in the Valencia region as "very difficult". On Monday morning, around 800,000 residents were under shelter-in-place orders; by late afternoon, the figure had fallen to 87,000 across eight municipalities, Al Jazeera reported. The Valencian regional government announced at noon that confinement orders had been lifted in most of the 145 affected municipalities, Xinhua reported. In Els Poblets, northeast of Alicante, floodwaters piled cars and vans on top of one another as residents tried to salvage belongings from their inundated homes.
The scenes brought back memories of the disaster two years ago, when catastrophic flooding claimed more than 230 lives across the Valencia region. Spain's meteorological agency AEMET described the episode as exceptionally severe: the region last recorded comparable rainfall in November 1987, when 817 liters per square meter fell in Oliva in 24 hours, the highest such total recorded in Spain. AEMET announced on Friday that last month was mainland Spain's hottest September on record, after the country registered its warmest summer between June and August, AFP reported. Scientists say human-driven climate change is intensifying the Mediterranean storms that typically hit eastern Spain in autumn as the sea absorbs heat during the summer, leading to increased evaporation and heavier rainfall.
Source: GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
Photo: 资料图：2024年10月30日，西班牙瓦伦西亚省 Horta Sud 地区洪灾后的街道，非本次风暴「亚当」现场。照片：Pacopac 摄，CC BY-SA 4.0，经维基共享资源。 / File photo: a flooded street in Horta Sud, Valencia province, on 30 October 2024, during the October 2024 floods — not the current Storm Adam. Photo by Pacopac, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
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