Alicante has been devastated by flash floods that have swept cars down streets, just days after floods in Valencia killed 214 people.
New images and videos coming from the tourist hotspot, popular with British holidaymakers, show streets flooded with dirty rainwater that has fallen in recent days.
One video showed a man forced to swim away from his car after it was swept away underneath a bridge in Altea, which lies in the province. He could be seen swimming in his clothes towards a tree.
Another video showed water flowing rapidly down a set of stairs in the town of Altea, getting faster and faster as it gets to the bottom.
Alicante Airport is still sending and receiving passenger planes, though it has delayed dozens of flights, many of them coming from the UK.
It comes after the Valencia floods death toll rose to a horrifying 214, making them the deadliest floods in Spain’s history.
Dozens of people are still unaccounted for, as the country’s prime minister Pedro Sanches said he was sending in 5,000 more army troops to help with the searches and clean-up, in addition to the 2,500 soldiers already deployed.
‘It is the biggest operation by the Armed Forces in Spain in peacetime,’ Sanchez said. ‘The government is going to mobilize all the resources necessary as long as they are needed.’
Valencian regional authorities said on Saturday night the total number of fatalities in the region was 211, plus two from Castilla La Mancha and one in Andalusia.
The tragedy is already Europe’s worst flood-related disaster since 1967 when at least 500 people died in Portugal.
In Valencia’s Picanya suburb, shop-owner Emilia, 74, told Reuters on Saturday: ‘We feel abandoned, there are many people who need help.
‘It is not only my house, it’s all the houses and we are throwing away furniture, we are throwing away everything.
‘When is the help going to come to have fridges and washing machines? Because we can’t even wash our clothes and we can’t even have a shower.’
Nurse Maria Jose Gilabert, 52, who also lives in Picanya, said: ‘We are devastated because there is not much light to be seen here at the moment, not because they are not coming to help, they are coming from all over Spain, but because it will be a long time before this becomes a habitable area again.’
The storm triggered a new weather alert in the Balearic Islands, Catalonia and Valencia, where rains are expected to continue during the weekend.
Scientists say extreme weather events are becoming more frequent in Europe, and elsewhere, due to climate change.
Meteorologists think the warming of the Mediterranean, which increases water evaporation, plays a key role in making torrential rains more severe.
More to follow.