Flood disaster in Spain destroyed Valencia: At least 95 people died

It has been confirmed that at least 95 people died and dozens were missing due to heavy rains and flash floods in eastern Spain, around Valencia, Albacete and Cuenca on Tuesday. Heavy rains swept away villages, trapping tens of thousands of people in their homes, knocking out power to 120,000 people and causing widespread road closures.

Residents walk on the street after the flood in Paiporta, near Valencia, Spain, Wednesday, October 30, 2024. (AP Photo/Alberto Saiz)

Flood waters dragged people away as families with children and the elderly they were responsible for were struggling to survive. Attempts to reach the emergency service via 112 were met with silence due to the collapse of the lines. Chaos spread throughout the city as hundreds of people found themselves trapped in cars, trucks or on rooftops.

Most emergency rescue calls involved workers trapped in their jobs. Despite early warning of the storm’s impact, many businesses refused to cease operations, putting workers’ lives at risk. In industrial areas such as the El Oliveral industrial zone, work continued as usual despite the danger. Large companies including IKEA and Mercadona also insisted that employees go to work despite the flood risk.

The chaos in Paiporta began around 7pm on Tuesday. “The police warned us that the valley was overflowing. “Within a few minutes, the water rose from ankle level to waist level,” said local resident Óscar Pozo. eldiario.es. Within minutes, the power went out. “They only warned us when there was water on the streets and the police presence was right next to the valley,” he said, denouncing the “mismanagement” of the emergency. “The warning came too late,” he said.

The flood left mountains of debris scattered across affected areas. While images from Valencia showed cars stacked on the roads, Spain’s transport minister confirmed that damage to the railway line between Madrid and Valencia was serious and services were only expected to resume within the next four days. The storm is currently moving northwards across Spain and a red alert is in effect in Cadiz due to flood risks.

This disaster caused by climate change is the worst flood in Spain’s recent history, even deadlier than the 1957 Valencia flood, when torrential rains caused the Turia River to overflow, killing 80 people.

Sixty-seven years later, this tragic loss of life is not natural, but a social disaster caused by human-caused climate change. This situation reveals that the capitalist ruling class is incapable of taking even basic disaster prevention measures, let alone adopting a planned, coordinated policy to stop global warming.

Senior State Meteorologist and member of the Spanish Meteorological Society, Dr. Ernesto Rodríguez Camino said: “What we know in general terms is that in the context of climate change such intense and exceptional, rare rainfall events will become more frequent and more intense and therefore destructive. … When flash floods occur due to intense rain, the flood wave “It can move through the river basin at tremendous speed. This has been the case for centuries, but with increased rainfall, new areas are moving into areas at risk.”

Dr. from Imperial College London Friederike Otto said: Daily Mail: “With each degree of warming from fossil fuels, the atmosphere can hold more moisture, resulting in heavier precipitation. These deadly floods are another reminder of how dangerous climate change has become with even just 1.3°C of warming. But last week the UN warned that we are on track to experience warming of up to 3.1°C by the end of the century.”

Although Valencia is known as one of the most flood-prone areas in Europe, authorities have not taken significant action for decades. Located on the east coast of Spain, the city and its surroundings face major flood risks: heavy autumn rains come suddenly and severe storms occur. i need fria. It is particularly vulnerable to flash and coastal floods as urbanization and intensive agriculture reduce natural absorption areas, increase surface runoff and strain drainage systems.

In 2019, Valencia suffered deadly flooding as record-breaking rainfall caused intense flooding and at least 6 deaths. The Red Cross published a detailed study on the risks of flooding in the Valencia region in 2022, based on the 2019 floods, and called on Spanish authorities to undertake disaster response planning. His report advocated “legally requiring the development of regional and local disaster recovery plans to ensure effective rescue operations.”

But in the five years since 2019, nothing has been done to prepare Valencia for new floods.

In fact, a few months ago the Valencian regional government, led by the right-wing People’s Party (PP) led by Carlos Mazón, repealed a decree establishing the Valencian Emergency Unit (UVE). Government spokeswoman Ruth Merino pathetically claimed that this reflected Mazón’s determination to “optimize all public sector institutions and organizations for efficient management.”

This set the stage for a catastrophic failure by Spanish authorities to take any action in response to urgent warnings from scientists.

The first warnings came on October 25, five days before the disaster. Juan Jesús González Alemán, Senior State Meteorologist and researcher at the State Meteorological Agency, wrote about the “There is potential.” He warned that it would be “one of those that will be remembered on the Mediterranean side.”

At noon on Sunday, the Agency issued an official warning about the impact on Valencia, home to more than 5 million people. Using scientific forecasting methods, he correctly identified Tuesday as the peak of the storm: “On Tuesday the 29th, when the peak of this episode is expected, the probability of heavy precipitation will be highest in the Mediterranean region of the peninsula. … More than 150 mm of rain may fall in 24 hours in parts of the Valencian Community and Murcia.”

On Tuesday, Mazón delayed issuing emergency warnings despite the weather agency’s 8 a.m. warning. At noon, the Júcar Hydrographic Confederation reported that the valleys were overflowing and the Albaida River was rising rapidly. However, Mazón downplayed the warnings, saying: “According to the forecast, the storm is moving towards the Serranía de Cuenca, so its intensity is expected to decrease around 18:00 across Valencia.” This statement was later removed from official channels.

The Valencian government did not send an automatic emergency message to mobile phones until 20:12; but by then many people were already stranded by the flood.

The national PSOE-Sumar government likewise did nothing to strengthen Spanish disaster response plans or force Valencia regional authorities to take action. Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez was in India on Monday and Tuesday, trying to strengthen Spain’s military-industrial complex by selling Airbus C-295 aircraft to the Indian Air Force. It has now militarized the emergency response by deploying more than 1,000 soldiers from its Military Emergency Unit (UME) to assist in rescue operations.

Yesterday, European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell sarcastically declared that events in Spain “highlight the urgency of tackling the climate crisis, because the high temperature of the Mediterranean is one of the reasons behind the increasing frequency and intensity of these extreme weather events.”

Borrell is one of the leaders advocating for the EU to escalate the war against Russia, providing hundreds of billions of euros in arms and cash subsidies to turn Ukraine into a battlefield and the Ukrainian people into cannon fodder in NATO’s war against Russia.

Such wars underscore the impossibility of addressing the crisis of man-made climate change on the basis of the capitalist nation-state system. Instead of coordinating a planned, global response to protect the environment, the capitalist system is wasting vast resources on a fratricidal war that could escalate into a nuclear conflict. The Valencia floods once again revealed the inability of capitalist governments of all political persuasions to implement ecological policies or even plan basic disaster management procedures that meet the basic social needs of the population.

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