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Spain’s Valencia region, located in the east, faced the prospect of more intense rainfall on Wednesday, coming just a fortnight after historic floods swept through the area, claiming more than 200 lives.
With another storm sweeping through Spain, officials across multiple regions evacuated thousands of people, closed schools, and heightened alert levels to protect residents from worsening weather conditions.
Spain’s national weather agency, AEMET, issued a red alert—the highest level of warning—for Valencia’s coastal areas, predicting up to 180 millimeters of rainfall within a 12-hour span. The alert is set to remain in effect until midday (1100 GMT) on Thursday.
Valencia’s regional government extended the closure of educational institutions, including universities and schools, alongside day centers and sports complexes, while road access in the worst-hit areas was restricted to essential vehicles alone.
Officials there have warned sewage systems already clogged with mud could struggle to cope with a fresh storm.
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Many people in the destroyed town of Paiporta had barricaded their homes with planks or sandbags to try to protect them from fresh flooding, an AFP journalist saw.
A highly anticipated session of the local parliament where under-fire regional leader Carlos Mazon was due to explain his handling of the disaster was postponed from Thursday to Friday, a spokesman for the institution told AFP.
The October 29 catastrophe killed 223 people, almost all in the Valencia region, and caused enormous material damage expected to soar to tens of billions of euros.
AEMET also announced a red alert for part of the southern Andalusia region, where emergency services said more than 1,000 homes and almost 3,000 residents had been evacuated in and around the city of Malaga.
Footage on social media showed Malaga’s normally bustling commercial centre deserted and cars ploughing through rising water that had submerged roads.
