People buy goods at a flood-affected supermarket in Valencia, Spain, Thursday, October 31, 2024. (Manu Fernandez/AP)

BARRIO DE LA TORRE, Spain — Survivors of the worst natural disaster to hit Spain this century woke up to scenes of devastation Thursday after villages were wiped out by devastating floods that killed at least 95 people.

The death toll is expected to rise as the search continues, as authorities recover bodies from buildings and vehicles and an unknown number of people remain missing.

“Unfortunately, there are dead people inside some of the vehicles,” Spanish Transport Minister Óscar Puente said, referring to hundreds of cars and trucks stranded on roads painted brown with mud.

The result was similar to the damage left by a powerful hurricane or tsunami.

Cars piled up like broken toys, uprooted trees, downed power lines and household items stuck in mud littered the streets of Barrio de la Torre, a suburb of Valencia, just one of dozens of hard-hit areas. In the Valencia region, where 92 people died between Tuesday and Wednesday morning.

Walls of rushing water turned narrow streets into death traps and spawned rivers that tore apart the ground floors of houses; It swept away cars, people and everything else in its path. The flood destroyed bridges and made roads unusable.

“The neighborhood was destroyed, all the cars were on top of each other, literally torn to shreds,” said Christian Viena, owner of a dilapidated bar in Barrio de la Torre.

Regional officials said late Wednesday that no one was trapped on rooftops or in vehicles that needed to be rescued after helicopters rescued about 70 people. However, ground crews and citizens continued to inspect vehicles and houses damaged by the flood.

People clean their flood-affected homes in Utiel, Spain, Wednesday, October 30, 2024. (Manu Fernandez/AP)

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said in a statement after a meeting with regional authorities and emergency services in Valencia on Thursday, the first of three days of official mourning, “Our priority is to find the victims and the missing, so that we can help end the suffering of their families.” in European country.

Spain’s Mediterranean coast is accustomed to autumn storms that can cause flooding. However, this was the strongest flash flood event in recent memory. Scientists attribute this situation to climate change, which is behind increasing temperatures, droughts and the warming of the Mediterranean in Spain.

While the worst pain was inflicted on municipalities near the city of Valencia, the storms unleashed their fury on large areas of the southern and eastern coasts of the Iberian Peninsula. Two deaths were reported in the neighboring region of Castilla La Mancha. Southern Andalusia reported one death.

Homes as far southwest as Malaga in Andalusia, where a high-speed train derailed on Tuesday night, were left without water, but none of the nearly 300 passengers were injured.

Greenhouses and farms in the south of Spain, known as the garden of Europe for exported products, were also damaged by heavy rains and floods. The storms caused a devastating tornado in Valencia and a hailstorm in Andalusia that left holes in cars.

Heavy rains continued in the north on Thursday, and the Spanish weather agency issued a red alert for many counties in Castellón, the northernmost province of the Valencia region, and an orange alert for southern Tarragona and the west coast of Cadiz in northeastern Catalonia. across the country in the southwest.

“This storm front is still with us,” Sánchez said. “Stay at home and heed official advice and you will help save lives.”

A man reacts while waiting for news of his relatives trapped during floods in Valencia, Spain, Thursday, October 31, 2024. (Alberto Saiz/AP)

Search efforts continue during the demolition

More than a thousand soldiers from Spain’s emergency rescue units joined regional and local emergency workers to search for bodies and survivors. Soldiers recovered 22 bodies and rescued 110 people on Wednesday night.

“We are searching house to house,” Ángel Martínez with the military emergency unit told Spain’s national radio broadcaster RNE from the town of Utiel, where at least six people died.

About 150,000 people in Valencia were without electricity on Wednesday, but roughly half had it restored by Thursday, Spanish news agency EFE reported. The unknown number had no running water. Many bought whatever bottled water they could find.

People walked past stranded vehicles blocking the roads. The area remained partially isolated, with many roads cut and train lines disrupted, including a high-speed service to Madrid that authorities said would not be repaired for several days.

A man cried as he watched footage from national broadcaster RTVE showing the exterior of the building that was once the ground floor of his home in Catarroja, a town south of Valencia. It was as if a bomb had exploded inside, destroying their furniture and belongings, and even peeling the paint off some of the walls, leaving mud behind.

A man cleans his flood-affected house in Utiel, Spain, Wednesday, October 30, 2024. (Manu Fernandez/AP)

Officials questioned over late flood warnings

The severe weather event took regional government officials by surprise. Spain’s national meteorological service described the flood as “extraordinary”, stating that more rain fell in the Valencian town of Chiva in eight hours than in the previous 20 months.

But the relative calm of the next day also gave time to reflect and question whether authorities could have done more to limit the damage. The regional government of Valencia has been criticized for failing to send flood warnings to people’s mobile phones until 8pm on Tuesday, when flooding began in some areas, and after the national weather agency issued a red alert for heavy rains.

Andreu Salom, mayor of the village of L’Alcudia in Valencia, told RTVE that his town had lost at least two residents, a girl and her elderly mother who lived with them, and that police were still searching for the missing truck driver.

He also complained that he and the townspeople received no warning about the disaster that occurred when the Magro River overflowed on Tuesday evening.

“I was just going to check the river level because I had no information,” Salom said. “I went with the local police but we had to turn back because a tsunami of water, mud, reeds and soil was already entering the town.”

Mari Carmen Pérez said by phone from Barrio de la Torre that her phone rang with a flood warning after fast-flowing water blew open her front door, filling her living room, kitchen and bathroom, forcing her family to flee upstairs.

“They had no idea what was going on,” said Pérez, a professional cleaner. “Everything is ruined. “People here, we’ve never seen anything like this.”

Valencia regional President Carlos Mazón defended his administration’s management of the crisis, saying “all our auditors followed standard protocol.”

Wilson reported from Barcelona, ​​Spain. Associated Press writer Teresa Medrano in Madrid contributed to this report.