UK woman believed among 10 dead in Spanish floods
A body reported to be that of a British woman is discovered following severe storms in the southern Spanish town of Vera, Almeria which was decimated by flood waters.
The floods came after months of summer drought and high temperatures triggered thousands of Spanish wildfires. The destruction in the Almeria area was particularly horrendous, witnesses said.
Sewers backed up and vehicles overturned. One family had to be rescued from a rooftop after flash floods surprised them while they were milking their goats. More than 245 litres of water fell around Molina in 24 hours.
There were reports that Diana Dudas, 52, a British ex-pat who lived in Vera with her Spanish husband, had been missing for days before her body was found. But there was confusion on Sunday over whether her death had been confirmed.
“Her body was found washed up in the lagoon. I’m not sure exactly when it was that she went missing, but the heavy rain started on Thursday night,” Genny Sutcliffe, her friend, told reporters. But Britain’s Foreign Office could not confirm this on Sunday, and said they were in touch with both local authorities and the woman’s family.
Devastation
Mrs Sutcliffe, also a Spanish resident, said she was surrounded by devastation.
“I saw a house that had a car that had been swept into its front garden and a car in its back garden,” she said. “A lot of people aren’t going to be able to return to their homes for months.”
Britain’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office said it was looking into the incident and liaising with local authorities.
600 evacuated
An estimated 600 have been evacuated from homes in the Andalucian provinces of Malaga, Almeria and Murcia. Among the dead are two children found drowned in a car, Spanish national radio reported.
Jackie Broad, 58, in Mojacar, Almeria, said the river at the bottom of her road burst its banks.
“There was a lot of water, in some places up to the roofs of shops and houses,” she said. “A lot of the roads are closed so we’re having trouble getting around.”
Cruise death
In a second incident in the Mediterranean over the weekend, the search for a British woman when went missing on a P&O cruise was called off when a body was recovered.
The Aurora ship was sailing from Portugal to Barcelona, Spain at the time. The woman had not been named on Sunday.