Hours before a river of mud descended on towns around Valenciabitspin, trapping and killing hundreds of people, water started gushing through the small Spanish municipality of Utiel.

A quiet winemaking town on the upper reaches of the Magro River, inland from Valencia, Utiel sits about an hour’s drive from the sprawling, densely populated eastern coast of Spain that was inundated last month in some of Europe’s worst flooding in decades.

Heavy rains began in Utiel on the morning of Oct. 29. By about 1 p.m., the town’s narrow cobblestone streets were already filled with several inches of water. By 2 p.m., a muddy tide nearly reached the windows of the town’s low homes as the Magro spilled over its banks. Trash cans and cars drifted about like toy boats. By 3 p.m., the mayor said that he had alerted the firefighters and the military emergency unit.

“Everyone knew that we were drowning,” said the mayor, Ricardo Gabaldón.

Yet the regional authorities failed to alert towns and villages a few dozen miles lower down the Magro that the river was raging and coming their way, mayors said. Hours later, it hit those places, too.

“I don’t know why they didn’t warn us,” said José Javier Sanchis Bretones, the mayor of Algemesí, which was flooded in the evening, killing at least three people there.

Flooding began in the town

of Utiel at around 1 p.m.

DETAIL

Utiel

FLOW OF FLOODING

Requena

Valencia

Chiva

Paiporta

Torrent

Lake

Flash

floods

Algemesí

l’Alcúdia

Towns downstream,

including Algemesí,

received no warning the river

upstream was flooding.

20 MILES

Flooding began in the town

of Utiel at around 1 p.m.

Lake

Lake

Utiel

FLOW OF FLOODING

Med. Sea

Requena

Valencia

Chiva

Paiporta

Torrent

Lake

Flash

floods

DETAIL

Algemesí

l’Alcúdia

Towns downstream,

including Algemesí,

received no warning

the river upstream

was flooding.

20 MILES

Sources: Copernicus, OpenStreetMap, NASA, IGN

By Samuel Granados

Flash

floods

Damaged

buildings

and roads

Industrial

area

1 MILE

Rambla

del Poyo

N

Torrent

Aldaia

Paiporta

Catarroja

Alfafar

Valencia

Damaged

buildings and roads

Industrial area

Aldaia

Valencia

Flash floods

Torrent

Paiporta

3 MILES

Alfafar

Catarroja

Sources: Copernicus, OpenStreetMap, NASA, IGN

By Samuel Granados

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