‘It was like a tsunami’: Spaniards recount horror of deadly floods


“A very strong downpour came from above very suddenly… and the water rose a metre or a metre and a half in a few minutes,” said the mayor of the town of Riba-roja de Túria.

Elsewhere in the region, news that people were missing after being swept away by floodwaters began to emerge.

Yet the civil protection did not send a warning to residents of the Valencia region to warn them not to travel on the roads until more than two hours later, after 20:00.

Many have questioned the timing of that warning, which arrived more than 12 hours after the Spanish meteorological agency had issued its first red alert.

Some say that it arrived too late for people to seek refuge on the higher floors or to get off the roads, which were busy with commuters returning home after work.

Paco had been driving from Valencia to nearby Picassent when he was caught by surprise by the flash floods that swallowed up the roads.

He told El Mundo newspaper “the speed of the water was insane” as it dragged cars away: “The pressure was tremendous. I managed to get out of the car and the water pushed me against a fence that I managed to grab on to, but I couldn’t move.”

“It wouldn’t let me. It ripped my clothes off,” he said.

Patricia Rodríguez, from Sedaví, was also caught by the flooding as she drove home from work.

She told local media that water started to rise as she sat in a line of traffic near Paiporta and the cars started floating.

“We were afraid the river was going to burst its banks because we were right in the line of fire,” she said. She managed to escape on foot with the help of another driver and watched, terrified, as a young man nearby carried a new-born baby to safety.

“It was just as well that nobody slipped, because if we had, the current would have taken us away,” she said.

Social media posts help to paint a picture of the chaos that engulfed the region as night fell.



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