The floods have swept away cars and forced the evacuation of hundreds of people
MADRID, Sept 14 (NNN-AGENCIES) — At least five people have died and 3,500 have been evacuated from their homes after flash floods struck south-eastern Spain.
Rivers burst their banks as some areas of Valencia, Murcia and eastern Andalucía saw the heaviest rainfall on record.
Vehicles were swept away by rushing flood waters, causing at least three deaths.
The death toll had risen to five by Friday evening, including a man who drowned after driving into a flooded tunnel in the coastal town of Níjar. According to reports, two cars entered the tunnel as traffic police were placing bollards to close the road, with officers able to rescue two out of the cars’ three occupants.
On Thursday a brother and sister, aged 61 and 51, died when the car they were travelling in was caught up in floodwaters in the town of Caudete.
Another man was found dead in the village of Redovan in Valencia after leaving his home on foot earlier on Friday.
Torrential rain caused chaos on roads and public transport with two airports in Murcia and Almeria closing down, leaving travellers stranded.
Thousands of police, fire-fighters and soldiers have been deployed in a rescue operation, some in boats and helicopters.
One emergency worker said that a man was holding onto a traffic sign as he awaited rescue from the flooding.
Several railway lines and many schools in the region were shut down by the adverse weather conditions, with 689,000 students affected in Valencia alone.
“The situation is dramatic. We are not talking about a particular area, but the whole of Murcia,” the region’s president, Fernando López Miras, told the Cadena Ser radio station, adding that at least two towns, Torre Pacheco and San Javier in the Mar Menor resort area, were completely underwater.
López Miras has called a special meeting of the regional government to have Murcia declared as an official disaster zone.
Heavy rainfall and flash floods continued to cause havoc in many areas of Spain on Friday morning. Emergency services managed to rescue four people from an inundated road tunnel on a main motorway between Alicante and Murcia, where rescue workers used an inflatable lifeboat and a jet ski to free motorists from the rising water. — NNN-AGENCIES
