A British man living in Valencia as it was devastated by torrential floods killing more than 200 people has told of hearing his neighbours’ final screams before they died in an ‘urban river’.
The floods, which started last Monday, have swept through the city and upended nearly everything in sight, leaving homes and businesses destroyed and streets caked in a thick layer of mud.
Jerome Torres, 49, said that a week on from the floods beginning, the Spanish city looked like something out of an ‘apocalyptic’ horror film.
Mr Torres, who was trapped in his fourth-floor flat in the town of Paiporta with his partner Pablo, told of feeling terrified that their lives would end that day.
He said: ‘The water was reaching horrendous levels and we were hearing neighbours that were trapped in their ground floor houses starting to shout but it was impossible to go outside because of the strength of the water.
‘We could hear people shouting that were being taken by this urban river in our streets.
‘The neighbours on higher floors were throwing ropes and bedding to try to help people so that they could catch something and try to get out of the water.’
Though three people on Jerome’s street were killed by the floods, he said that a 90-year-old neighbour miraculously survived by standing on her furniture as water rushed into her home.
But she was trapped for more than four hours before the water began to subside and her neighbours could carry her to safety.
Mr Torres told the Sun: ‘In front of her house, there was a mound of mud, a meter and a half high.
‘It was very slippery and very difficult to navigate but they managed to do it. It took about 40 minutes to get her out.’
He and his partner were able to leave the flat the following morning, and stayed at his aunt’s house to recover.
But the scene laid before that was one of destruction and devastation.
He said: ‘The day that we came back and saw the devastation, it was completely unrecognisable.
‘It felt like an American Hollywood film. It was apocalyptic.’
He said he was furious with the local government for failing to warn Valencians of the dangers the storm posed.
‘The president of the region was on the radio saying there was no risk of flooding, so we thought we were safe. It was a death trap for many’, Mr Torres added.
He was one of many Valencians angry with the authorities for their handling of the floods.
On Sunday, mud pies and empty bottles were hurled at King Felipe and his wife, Queen Letizia, who were visiting the impacted region.
Queen Letizia could be seen with mud speckled over her face, while one of the bodyguards escorting the royals in Paiporta had seemingly been hit by an object as he had a cut on his forehead, which caused blood to run down his face.
The crowd shouted ‘murderers’ and other insults at the royals and government officials like Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez during the visit on Sunday.
Police had to step in, with some officers on horseback to keep back the crowd of several dozens.
Bodyguards opened umbrellas to protect the royal visitors and officials as protesters hurled mud at them.
After being forced to seek protection, the king and queen remained calm and made several efforts to speak to individual residents, while local officials facing an outcry fled.
The king and queen spent an hour trying to calm tempers before leaving themselves, while Mr Sanchez and the head of the Valencia region, Carlos Mazon, quickly left – but not before the rear window of the premier’s vehicle was broken.
Mr Mazon later said in a post on X, formerly Twitter: ‘I understand the social anger and of course, I’m here to receive it. This is my political and moral obligation.’
Isabel Diaz Ayuso, president of the community government in Madrid, prasied the King over his visit and added that Queen Letizia had embodied ‘the sentiment of Spain’.
With the search for survivors and the dead still online, the death toll for what is already Europe’s worst flood-related disaster since 1967 when at least 500 people died in Portugal, is expected to rise.
The Spanish government has now vowed to ‘improve’ recovery efforts with the deployment of 10,000 soldiers and police officers.
Authorities in hard-hit Valencia said on Sunday that hopes of finding more survivors are fading after the catastrophic floods wrecked homes and vehicles, leaving locals stranded without power and vital supplies.
There was no let up in the storms on MOnday as heavy downpours caused flooding in Barcelona, with Spain’s weather service issuing a red alert for ‘continuous and torrential rains’ along the coast and telling people to stay alert and not travel ‘unless strictly necessary’.
Mobile phones sounded with an alert for ‘extreme and continued rainfall’ on the southern outskirts of the city, urging people to avoid any normally dry gorges or canals where they could fall victim to rising waters.
Roads across the region have been blocked by mudslides and high water, with motorists filmed driving through submerged streets as they desperately try to get home to safety.
At Barcelona’s El Prat airport, shocking videos have shown water streaming into the terminal building and pouring from the ceilings, with travellers seen taking their shoes off and wading through the departures hall.
British couple Terry and Don Turner, aged 74 and 78, who had not been seen since torrential rains hit the Valencia region on Tuesday, were confirmed to be among the dead.
Their daughter Ruth O’Loughlin, from Burntwood, Staffordshire, said that her parents’ bodies had been found inside their car on Saturday.
Their deaths bring the number of Brits confirmed dead in the tragedy to three, with a 71-year-old man losing his life after being rescued from the floods in Malaga.
The British man was rescued by boat last Tuesday by firefighters after his partner alerted the authorities because he was having an apparent heart attack and suffering from hypothermia.
According to scientists, the storms had concentrated over the Margo and Turia river basins, and in the Poyo riverbed, produced large walls of water that overflowed riverbanks – catching locals off guard as they went about their day on Tuesday evening.
Spain’s national weather service said in the hard-hit Chiva area, it rained more in eight hours than it had in the preceding 20 months, calling the deluge ‘extraordinary’.
When authorities initially sent alerts to mobile phones warning of the seriousness of the flooding and asking people to stay at home, many were already on the road, working, or covered in water in low-lying areas or underground garages, which quickly became death traps.
Locals have told media that warnings and alerts came ‘far too late’ as many people were already trapped in the rising flood waters.
Survivors who have lost everything in the disaster have expressed their anger at authorities, who they say failed to warn them in time and were slow in their response.
Spain’s AEMET weather centre in Valencia warned of heavy rainfall at 7:30am on Tuesday, raising the alert level to red in some areas and warning residents to stay off the roads in case of flooding.
But by 10:30am, firefighters were scrambling to rescue people in the floods that seemed to appear out of nowhere.
Footage has captured people scrambling to escape their homes on foot or in their cars, before being swept away in the currents of muddy flood water as they cling on to rails and lamp posts.
AEMET warned residents to remain vigilant, even if there was little rainfall in their areas, as ravines and gullies were quickly filling with water pouring down from the mountains towards the sea.
At noon, Valencia’s president, Carlos Mazon, seemed to downplay the crisis by saying the storm was subsiding, contradicting the warnings of emergency services, and just five hours later, the city’s emergency services were swarmed with hundreds of pleas for help.
It was at 8pm that mobile phones finally went off with the public alert telling residents to stay indoors, but it was too little too late as people were already dealing with the crushing floods.
According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, extreme weather events causing highly impactful floods and droughts have become more likely and more severe due to climate change.
World Meteorological Organisation Secretary-General Celeste Saulo said: ‘As a result of rising temperatures, the hydrological cycle has accelerated.
‘It has also become more erratic and unpredictable, and we are facing growing problems of either too much or too little water. A warmer atmosphere holds more moisture which is conducive to heavy rainfall.’
The catastrophic downpours were fuelled by a destructive weather system which sees cold and warm air clash and produce powerful rain clouds, experts said.