The Oct-29 floods in Valencia turned into one of Spainʼs worst natural disasters – 229 people lost their lives (most of them in cars or basement garages) and damage costs reached billions
When King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia visited affected areas with Pedro Sánchez and Carlos Mazón‚ angry citizens threw mud at them; showing their frustration with the governmentʼs slow-paced response. The clean-up started with regular people helping out‚ including some far-right groups that tried to use this situation for their benefit
The disaster sparked a blame-game between regional leader Mazón and prime minister Sánchez. Both tried to avoid responsibility: one said central government was too slow while other pointed out that emergencies are managed locally. They both called it an un-predictable event (which isnt exactly true)
- Regional government didnt raise emergency level properly
- Warning systems failed to reach people in time
- Underground garage evacuation rules werent clear
- Emergency response unit was removed before floods
This reminds of similar floods in Germany and Belgium about 3 years ago where 243 people died. Scientists say both disasters happened because of climate change – Valenciaʼs rain was 12% heavier than it would be in pre-industrial times
The handling of this crisis showed big problems in Spainʼs emergency system. Teresa Ribera‚ who became EU commissioner on Dec-1‚ got criticism for canceling an important flood-control project back in 2021. The weather agency AEMET warned about heavy rain 5 days before disaster but Mazón ignored it and even said at lunch-time that storm would calm down by evening
Both central and regional governments failed to learn from 2021 European floods experience – they had same problems with alerts timing coordination and emergency response. Now they keep arguing about who shouldʼve done what instead of fixing the system