The early Saturday morning rainfall in the northern Costa Daurada exceeded all the Govern’s forecasts. The administrations did not issue any Es-Alert, mobile phones did not ring excessively, citizens did not receive any noisy warnings on their phones… and within a few hours, more than 400 people had to be evacuated and eleven were injured, one of them critically.
Even a nightclub was evacuated very hastily. Apparently, several testimonies claim that they were taken out suddenly, very quickly, with little organization… Despite this, the Govern defended its forecasts and applauded the rapid action of the Protecció Civil forces, local police, firefighters… All of them prevented disaster.
El Vendrell, Roda de Berà, Creixell, and Torredembarra were undoubtedly the municipalities most affected by the rains, according to the evaluation provided by Protecció Civil in a statement. Specifically, in El Vendrell, 145.4 liters per square meter were recorded in 24 hours, while in Torredembarra, 136.5 liters per square meter were reached.
Streets flooded with water, flooded house basements, urban furniture and cars dragged by water, and trees, bushes, and hedges uprooted. A couple of campsites were partially evacuated, and water unexpectedly burst into major festivals, summer celebrations, and cocktail bars…
Additionally, many vacationers’ vehicles were trapped in completely flooded parking lots. “If we had been warned,” said the vacationers, many visitors to the area… “We wouldn’t have left the cars there.” These intense, apparently unexpected rains left behind a very disturbing and unsettling landscape.
“Weather is not an exact science,” said the Minister of Justice, Ramon Espadaler
It is not a catastrophic situation, but many woke up with the impression that such a huge scare could have been avoided, that they could have prepared much better. The night and early morning this Saturday were very long on the Tarragona coast, between the Baix Penedès and northern Tarragonès regions.
The Govern, however, looked to the sky and defended its weather forecasts. The Generalitat’s Minister of Justice, Ramon Espadaler, before meeting with the mayors of the affected municipalities, emphasized that the town halls and the different police and emergency forces reacted “very quickly.”
And when asked why the Es-Alert did not sound, Espadaler explained that at the time the heaviest rains occurred, the Servei Meteorològic de Catalunya (SMC) did not report a sufficient level to activate the alert. “Weather is not an exact science,” said the Minister of Justice, “and it is not advisable to issue an alert if you do not have quality information, which at that moment was not available.”
Protecció Civil maintains the special emergency plan for floods (Inuncat) in alert phase to monitor incidents. The agency explained that it is monitoring the evolution of the situation and will evaluate the deactivation of the plan “as normality is restored.”
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The accumulation of water and the force with which it flowed down torrents, avenues, and streams in municipalities such as Roda de Berà, Torredembarra, Creixell, or Vendrell forced emergency teams to mobilize and make dozens of trips to evacuate people and attend to the injured.
There were nearly 700 calls to 112 on a night that for many was endless and unforgettable
The worst affected was a girl who was with her family near the port of Roda de Berà (Tarragonès) and who on Saturday night was still hospitalized at Joan XXIII Hospital in Tarragona with a reserved prognosis, after being admitted in critical condition. A wall of a house located next to the port collapsed due to the force of the torrential water and hit the family, who had been working at a market that afternoon.
“The force of the water and wind has knocked down pines like I have never seen in my 62 years in Roda,” highlighted Pere Virgili, mayor of Roda de Berà. “The water has swept away the road signs and on top of that has destroyed the beaches.” In this way, for many in Tarragona, the night suddenly became endless.
There were nearly 700 calls to 112, 200 alerts to firefighters, and 35 activations of the Servei de Emèrgencies Mèdiques (SEM). “We had never seen anything like it,” many agreed during the morning, after the huge scare, bailing water from their basements, garages, patios, and gardens.
Behind are now some dark hours of August 22 in which the safety of people was feared at several points on the Costa Daurada. Anguish and ultimately a very bad time at a couple of campsites in Roda and Creixell (Tarragonès) where it was necessary to evacuate nearly 300 people. Many were stunned. They grabbed the little ones and ran out.
Also in El Vendrell (Baix Penedès), firefighters had to rescue about a hundred young people from a nightclub. There, they also complained that no one warned them about what could happen. “The concern now is to put everything back in order, luckily the risk to people has passed,” said Kenneth Martínez, mayor of El Vendrell.
“The concern now is to put everything back in order,” said the mayor of El Vendrell hours later
The orography of the affected lands, with torrents and streams that flow abruptly into the sea, and some level crossings next to the railway track, as in the case of Roda de Berà, greatly complicated the situation experienced. Suddenly, in a very short time, a lot of water accumulated.
The management of the rainfall was also complicated by the presence of works to better regulate the water that flows with such force when torrential rains like these occur. These are extreme situations increasingly frequent due to the climate emergency that require measures to be taken as soon as possible.
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