More than 70 people killed by severe flooding in Spain

More than 70 people have died after torrential floods in Spain, officials said.

The floods lashed southeastern Spanish cities from Malaga to Valencia on Tuesday, October 29, according to Associated Press.

This is what government officials say to the Spanish newspaper El País on Wednesday 30 October that the death toll from the flood has risen in Valencia to 72.

A year’s rainfall fell in about eight hours in Valencia, according to Reuters and that BBC. It is the deadliest flood in Spain in three decades and more than 140,000 people are without power in Valencia.

It is also unclear how many people are missing. Ángel Víctor Torres, Spain’s Minister of Territorial Policy, said: “The fact that we cannot disclose a number of the missing persons indicates the scale of the tragedy,” he said. AP reported.

Pictures from the flood-affected areas show damaged cars, people walking through floodwaters and piles of soil deposits left behind when the floodwaters receded in some areas.

Valencia authorities said more than 200 people were rescued from cars after they were caught in the floods, according to ABC News.

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Christian Viena, a bar owner in the Valencian village of Barrio de la Torre, told the AP that the mud is 30 centimeters (almost a foot) in some areas.

“Everything is a total wreck,” she added. “Everything is ready to be thrown away.”

The Spanish government has declared three days of mourning in the wake of the deadly floods, according to The Guardian.

The European Union has offered its support to Spain. In a post on Xchairman of the EU Commission Ursula von der Leyen said “Europe is ready to help” in Spanish.

“What we see in Spain is devastating,” von der Leyen wrote in English. “My thoughts are with the victims, their families and the rescue teams.”

Spanish President Pedro Sánchez expressed the government’s solidarity with the families affected by the tragedy in a Spanish-language post on X.

“We will help you as long as it takes,” Sánchez wrote. “We will not leave you alone. All of Spain is with you.”

Spain’s King Felipe VI also shared a post on X saying he was “devastated” by the floods and offered his “heartfelt condolences” to those affected, according to the BBC.

This is the deadliest flood since the 1996 Pyrenees flood that killed 87 people, Reuters reported.