onsdag 30 oktober 2024

The climate threat The floods in Spain

En kvinna blickar ut över en gata i Valencia.
Spain declares three days of national mourning after the disaster

Spain declares three days of national mourning after the severe floods that claimed more than 90 lives in the region of Valencia. This is reported by the Spanish television channel RTVE.

The country's King Felipe VI has given a speech to the country's inhabitants. The king spoke of a "huge destruction" of infrastructure and that it is still difficult to get to some places.

- We want to convey our participation to all the families who have been affected, who have lost their loved ones and who in some cases still do not know what has happened to some of their relatives, says Felipe VI according to the BBC.

The three-day mourning period begins tomorrow, Thursday. On the same day, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez plans to visit Valencia, according to RTVE.
 
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Analysis: The Mediterranean is a ticking climate bomb

The rainfall and subsequent floods in Spain are so extreme that scientists already see it as an effect of climate change, writes DN's Peter Alestig in an analysis.

He writes that the UN climate panel IPCC has singled out the affected coast as a risk zone. It may seem paradoxical that an area with rising heat is hit by extreme downpours, but the explanation lies in the fact that rising heat causes water from seas and waterways to evaporate faster and faster, he writes.

"Therefore, the precipitation also contains more water."

In an analysis in The Guardian, Ajit Niranjan writes about the same phenomenon linked to climate change, and that similar disasters are likely to await in other countries in the region.

According to the Italian climate scientist Stefano Materia, drought and torrential rain are two sides of the same "climate change coin". He says that evaporated water is one of several ingredients that fuel and exacerbate extreme weather like what has happened in Spain.

- The Mediterranean is now a ticking time bomb.
 
Over 90 dead in Spain: "It was like a tsunami"

The death toll from the floods in eastern Spain has risen to 95 people, making it one of the deadliest disasters in the country in decades, AP writes.

El Pais writes that 40 of the deaths were registered in Paiporta in Valencia. Among the victims are children and several residents of a nursing home. Residents testify of panic as the water rushed forward. One of them says that she will not forget the cries of a neighbor.

- She asked for help when her husband was drowning. He died.

21-year-old Guillermo Serrano Pérez says he survived by leaving his car and climbing onto a bridge.

- It came like a wave. It was like a tsunami.

According to Las Provincias, over 100⁠ 000 people are still without power and the search for missing persons continues.
 

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