Spain overwhelmed by rain: 142 liters in a few hours in Madrigueras, a 102-year-old woman dies

A 102-year-old woman died in her home, dozens of people rescued, roads transformed into torrents and cars dragged by the water. It is the most serious toll of the wave of bad weather that has hit eastern Spain in the last few hours, with particularly intense rainfall between Castilla-La Mancha, the Valencian Community and Catalonia.

The most dramatic situation was recorded in Madrigueras, a municipality in the province of Albacete, where 142 liters of rain per square meter fell. The water quickly invaded the streets and numerous homes, in some cases exceeding a meter in height.

This is where a 102-year-old woman was found lifeless inside her home. According to regional authorities, water had managed to enter the building, reaching a level of more than one metre.

Ninety people rescued in Madrigueras

The rainfall required a large-scale intervention by the emergency services. Between Friday afternoon and the early hours of the night, around 90 people were rescued, many of whom were stuck in homes affected by the flooding.

The government of Castilla-La Mancha has activated the METEOCAM plan, the regional device for the risk linked to adverse meteorological phenomena, in operational situation 1.

The images arriving from the area show completely submerged streets and large quantities of mud dragged by the current. Some road links were interrupted, while Guardia Civil, firefighters and emergency teams continued to work to assist the population and clear the affected areas.

In Valencia almost 100 millimeters of rain in an hour

The bad weather also hit the Valencian Community hard. In Alzira, in the province of Valencia, one of the most intense phases of the disturbance discharged almost 97 liters per square meter in just one hour and 143 liters in four hours, according to data reported by the EFE agency based on findings from the Valencian Meteorology Association.

The quantity of water that fell in a very short time temporarily caused some drainage systems to fail and caused the flooding of several roads.

The Valencian Emergency Coordination Center handled 237 reports related to rain between Thursday and the night between Friday and Saturday.

Already on the eve of the episode, the Spanish state meteorological agency, AEMET, had raised the warnings for some coastal areas of Valencia and Castellón to the red level – the one associated with an “extraordinary danger”. Forecasts indicated the possibility of accumulations of up to 90 millimeters in one hour and 250 millimeters over twelve hours.

In some areas, lessons had been suspended in advance and the population had received emergency messages inviting them to limit their movements and stay away from rivers and barrancos, the often dry waterways which can fill up in a very short time during torrential rains.

Torrential rain also in Catalonia

The episode also affected Catalonia, in particular the Terres de l’Ebre, in the south of the region.

In Montsià and Baix Ebre the firefighters rescued around twenty people who were stuck in their vehicles. Some road links, including the C-12 between Amposta and Tortosa, were also temporarily interrupted.

In the south of the province of Tarragona, accumulations locally exceeded 200 liters per square meter during the most intense phase of the event. During Friday AEMET then withdrew the red warnings for Tarragona and Castellón, while maintaining high attention for new rains and thunderstorms in the eastern sector of Spain.

For the Catalan coast, AEMET still indicated the possibility of very intense showers and thunderstorms between Friday evening and Saturday, especially in the waters near Tarragona.

What is causing such heavy rains

At the basis of the worsening there is a situation of strong atmospheric instability due to the presence of cold air at medium-high altitudes and at the same time a significant supply of humidity coming from the Mediterranean.

It is a configuration capable of favoring very intense and persistent thunderstorms, especially when humid air masses encounter colder air at altitude and are forced to rise rapidly. AEMET reported that the episode mainly affects the eastern and north-eastern sector of the Iberian Peninsula and, in part, the Balearic Islands.

The term often used in Spain in situations of this type is DANA, an acronym for Depresión Aislada en Niveles Altosthat is, an isolated depression at high altitudes. However, not every episode of torrential rain can automatically be traced back to a DANA: what determines the effects on the ground is the interaction between the atmospheric configuration, the available humidity, the sea temperature and the local characteristics of the territory.

The memory of the 2024 flood is still alive

The new images of roads transformed into rivers come less than two years after the catastrophic flood that hit mainly the province of Valencia on 29 October 2024 and caused over 220 deaths.

Precisely that event made the authorities pay particularly high attention to episodes of extreme rainfall. Before the arrival of the rains in recent days, Es-Alert messages had already been sent to the population in several risk areas and preventive measures had been adopted.

However, the situation remains evolving: meteorological warnings can be modified within a few hours and, to know the areas actually affected by the alert levels, the reference remains the updated AEMET map.