A family in Valencia, Spain, continues to desperately search for two teenage boys after floodwaters took them from their father a week ago.

Victor Matías, whose wife was working the late shift, returned home on October 29 after picking up his two sons, 3-year-old Rubén and 5-year-old Izan, from nursery and was preparing to prepare dinner for them when the house was covered by flood waters. according to BBC.

As the flooding intensified, Victor sat the crying children in their bedrooms and tried to reassure them: Times reported. Just a few minutes later, the water and the truck it was carrying broke through a wall and carried the trio from their home into a nearby valley.

“Everything that was dragged into the creek bed (cars, trees and a container) hit the outside wall of the bedroom with a loud crash,” said Barbara Sastre, the boys’ aunt. Times.

Next-door neighbor Jonathan Perez told the BBC that Victor held his sons in his arms as the waters swept them away. But despite their best efforts, the children were swept away by the floodwaters, and so was Victor.

“Victor stood up again and carried the children in his arms. But then he realized he didn’t have them anymore,” Perez said. “The water washed away everything in its path.”

According to the BBC, Victor’s mother said that she almost surrendered to the flood waters after her sons were dragged away, but she continued on her way because she could not leave her wife alone.

The father of two was found four hours later, clinging to a tree a few hundred meters from the house. After more than a week of intense daily searches, Rubén and Izan are still missing.

They are not the only people missing after the devastating floods, the BBC reports, but they are the children who have since made headlines as “los niños desaparecidos” or “missing children” as the search continues.

Their aunt said the brothers’ family was “devastated” by their absence; This sentiment is also evidenced by the boys sleeping with their blankets while Victor recovers from his injuries from the flood, according to the BBC.

“We were destroyed,” Sastre said Times. “They are too young and too many days have passed.”

Sastre also described the young boys as high-energy, joyful children who loved cartoons. “They were very happy children,” Sastre told the BBC.

Their neighbor Perez echoed that sentiment and expressed anger at the timing of the official flood warning, which he felt came too late.

“They were loving life and hadn’t even started to be humans; they were 3 and 5,” he said of the little boys.

“With better coordination, better management and an earlier alarm (even half an hour earlier) these children could have been saved,” he added, “and those parents would not have gone through hell.”

It was stated that Izan and Rubén were among the 89 people whose names are still unknown after the deadly flood that occurred on Tuesday, November 5. Associated Press And Times. Meanwhile, at least 217 people have been confirmed killed.