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FLOODS

Five dead and three still missing after flash floods in Spain

The death toll from the heavy rains that lashed Spain on Sunday has increased to five as emergency services continue to look for three other people who have been missing since the flash floods that caused havoc across the country.

Published: 5 September 2023 09:31 CEST
Five dead and three still missing after flash floods in Spain
A destroyed car in the middle of a river in the town of Aldea del Fresno, in the Madrid region on September 4, 2023, as a man was reported missing after his vehicle was swept away by an overflowing river during heavy rains. (Photo by Oscar DEL POZO CAÑAS / AFP)

The weekend storm affected almost the whole country, with the heaviest rains recorded on Sunday in the coastal provinces of Cádiz, Tarragona and Castellón, according to state weather office Aemet.

Three people died in the central province of Toledo as a result of the storm, the head of the regional government of Castilla La Mancha, Emiliano García-Page, said without giving extra details.

Spanish media said a man was found dead by police during a rescue attempt on a road near the town of Bargas while another man died as rescuers tried to reach him in the town of Casarrubios del Monte.

Two men aged 31 and 34 died also died on Saturday, drowned by torrential rain while trying to climb a gorge in the north-eastern region of Aragón.

Police announced on Monday afternoon that the body of a man in his fifties was found near a river in the town of Camarena, also in the province of Toledo.

Officers of the Guardia Civil search a river bed in the town of Aldea del Fresno. (Photo by Oscar DEL POZO CAÑAS / AFP)
 

Emergency services were looking for a man who went missing after his car was swept away early on Monday by a swollen river in the rural area of Aldea del Fresno west of Madrid, a spokesman from Madrid’s emergency services, Javier Chivite, told public television RTVE.

Firefighters found his 10-year-old son – who was also in the car and was initially reported as missing – on Monday on top of a tree, he added.

Emergency services had rescued the boy’s mother and sister earlier in the day.

“The poor boy spent the night perched in a tree,” the head of the regional government of Madrid, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, told reporters.

The family, who live in the Madrid suburb of Alcorcón, were staying at a holiday home they own in Aldea del Fresno when the storm hit. They took to the road because they became alarmed by the flash flooding, she added.

A bridge demolished by the swelling of Alberche river following heavy rains in Aldea del Fresno, in the Madrid region, on September 4th 2023.(Photo by OSCAR DEL POZO / AFP)
 

Several bridges collapsed in Aldea del Fresno and torrents of water swept away many cars, according to an AFP reporter at the scene.

Police were also looking for an 83-year-old man who was swept away by floodwaters in the neighbouring town of Villamanta, as well as for a woman who went missing in the town of Valmojado in Toledo, local emergency services said.

A helicopter was deployed to rescue people who sought safety on the roofs of their homes in Toledo.

‘Behave with caution’

On Sunday residents of the Madrid region received an emergency text in Spanish and English accompanied by a loud alarm urging them not to use their vehicles and stay at home due the “extreme risk of storms”.

It was the first time the authorities had used this mobile phone alert system.

Several theatres closed early on Sunday, and the day’s football match between Atletico Madrid and Sevilla was suspended.

A number of metro lines were closed in Madrid during the morning rush hour on Monday due to flooding caused by heavy overnight rains, although by the mid-afternoon they were all open again.

High-speed rail links between Madrid and the southwestern region of Andalusia and the east coast region of Valencia, which closed on Sunday, reopened on Monday although trains were running at slower speeds in some sections, railway operator Renfe said.

The heavy rainfall eased on Monday morning. Aemet lowered its alert level for the Madrid region to yellow from a maximum red alert on Sunday.

A truck driving through a flooded street in Madrid on September 4th. (Photo by Thomas COEX / AFP)
 

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez thanked emergency services for their work and urged people to “continue to behave with caution”.

The torrential weather comes after Spain — which has endured three years of scant rainfall that has prompted some regions to impose water use restrictions — endured an intense heatwave and persistent high temperatures in August.

Scientists warn that extreme weather such as heatwaves and storms is becoming more intense as a result of climate change.

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CLIMATE CRISIS

‘Extreme’ climate blamed for world’s worst wine harvest in 62 years

World wine production dropped 10 percent last year, the biggest fall in more than six decades, because of "extreme" climate changes, the body that monitors the trade said on Thursday.

Published: 26 April 2024 08:48 CEST
'Extreme' climate blamed for world's worst wine harvest in 62 years

“Extreme environmental conditions” including droughts, fires and other problems with climate were mostly to blame for the drastic fall, said the International Organisation of Vine and Wine (OIV) that covers nearly 50 wine producing countries.

Australia and Italy suffered the worst, with 26 and 23 percent drops. Spain lost more than a fifth of its production. Harvests in Chile and South Africa were down by more than 10 percent.

The OIV said the global grape harvest was the worst since 1961, and worse even than its early estimates in November.

In further bad news for winemakers, customers drank three per cent less wine in 2023, the French-based intergovernmental body said.

Director John Barker highlighted “drought, extreme heat and fires, as well as heavy rain causing flooding and fungal diseases across major northern and southern hemisphere wine producing regions.”

Although he said climate problems were not solely to blame for the drastic fall, “the most important challenge that the sector faces is climate change.

“We know that the grapevine, as a long-lived plant cultivated in often vulnerable areas, is strongly affected by climate change,” he added.

France bucked the falling harvest trend, with a four percent rise, making it by far the world’s biggest wine producer.

Wine consumption last year was however at its lowest level since 1996, confirming a fall-off over the last five years, according to the figures.

The trend is partly due to price rises caused by inflation and a sharp fall in wine drinking in China – down a quarter – due to its economic slowdown.

The Portuguese, French and Italians remain the world’s biggest wine drinkers per capita.

Barker said the underlying decrease in consumption is being “driven by demographic and lifestyle changes. But given the very complicated influences on global demand at the moment,” it is difficult to know whether the fall will continue.

“What is clear is that inflation is the dominant factor affecting demand in 2023,” he said.

Land given over to growing grapes to eat or for wine fell for the third consecutive year to 7.2 million hectares (17.7 million acres).

But India became one of the global top 10 grape producers for the first time with a three percent rise in the size of its vineyards.

France, however, has been pruning its vineyards back slightly, with its government paying winemakers to pull up vines or to distil their grapes.

The collapse of the Italian harvest to its lowest level since 1950 does not necessarily mean there will be a similar contraction there, said Barker.

Between floods and hailstones, and damp weather causing mildew in the centre and south of the country, the fall was “clearly linked to meteorological conditions”, he said.

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