ReutersSoutheastern Spain has been hit by flash floods this week, with many wondering why the death toll, now over 200, is so high.
Nearly all the deaths confirmed so far have occurred in the Valencia region on the Mediterranean coast.
Some areas were particularly damaged: the town of Piporta, population 25,000, reported at least 62 deaths.
A variety of factors, including drivers trapped in their cars, poor planning by officials and extreme rainfall exacerbated by climate change, could be to blame.
The civil protection agency overseen by the regional government sent an emergency alert to the phones of people in the city of Valencia and surrounding areas just after 20:00 local time (19:00 GMT) on Tuesday, by which time the floods had receded rapidly. Areas are on the rise, and in some cases have wreaked havoc.
A large number of victims were on the road when the flash flood broke out, many of them returning home from get off work.
Video footage shows the first wave of water rushing over Piporta as cars were still moving. While other areas such as Uttil and Chihua received heavier rainfall, Paipota’s location (with a canyon in the center) made the effects of flooding particularly devastating.
Mayor Maribel Arbat said the town was poorly planned and had many ground-floor apartments. Six residents of a care home died when floodwaters swept into the building while they were on the ground floor. She also said there is a sense of complacency.
“In Piporta we rarely have flooding and people are not afraid,” she said.
The garage is a special death trap.
“When it rains, people usually go to the garage and take their cars out to prevent the garage from flooding,” Ms. Arbat said.
That appears to be the case in the Valencian suburb of La Torre, where seven bodies were discovered in the garage of a home.
The A3 motorway linking Valencia to Madrid was one of the roads where many motorists were stranded by rising water levels, leaving them unsure whether it was safer to stay in their cars.
One survivor told Telecinco TV channel: “It is almost certain that more people died because people getting off the bus were swept away by the water.” Another survivor said the water had reached his chest.
One witness said he saw a driver get out of his car and tie himself to a lamppost with a belt to prevent him from being swept away. It’s unclear whether he survived.
Chihuahua Mayor Amparo Ford warned on Thursday that there were still “hundreds of overturned cars and there must be people inside” nearby.
The National Guard shared tips on how to escape from a car during flooding Thursday morning on social media. People caught in floodwaters are advised to try to escape through car windows and windshields.
Other factors also appear to help explain why Valencia is so severely damaged by weather events.
Much of the worst-affected area in and around the country’s third-largest city is densely populated.
Insufficient rainfall throughout the rest of the year prevents the ground from effectively absorbing rainwater in many areas of eastern and southern Spain.
Pablo Aznar, a researcher at the Socioeconomic Observatory of Floods and Droughts (Obsis), warned that much of the affected area had experienced what he called “unfettered development”, with many areas covered Covered with impermeable materials, this “increases the risk” caused by these incidents.
A warming climate may also be increasing the severity of flooding.
The World Weather Attribution (WWA), an international group of scientists studying the role of global warming in extreme weather, found in a preliminary report that Spain has experienced a 12% increase in rainfall due to climate change, while weather events experienced Twice that of Spain.
