Local

Manolo Verdejo can be considered almost one of the veteran firefighters of the Villalba park: he has been practicing the profession in the Community of Madrid for 24 years. “I had never experienced anything like this in a forest fire,” he tells La Vanguardia in a phone interview. “Three fires came together and we had to change the operation very quickly,” he admits.

The Fire Consortium has declared the forest fire, which started around 12:50 p.m. this Saturday in the Salt de l’Aigua ravine area of the Valencian town of Manises, as stabilized. However, the bad news is that the local City Council has reported on social media that the fire has claimed the life of one person. The council has decreed two days of official mourning, tomorrow and Monday.

Railway sinkholes in the districts of Sarrià-Sant Gervasi and Nou Barris, and a gas deflagration with more than 12 hours of flames in the main square of Sants-Montjuïc. In recent days, Barcelona has seen a series of disturbing incidents linked to public works that have generated a certain distrust among citizens. Technicians say there is nothing to fear, that it is just a coincidence and that one must have faith that things are done well. In the case of Sants square, the accessibility works for the metro station caused the perforation of a gas pipe this Wednesday, turning the street into an immense brazier two days before the anniversary of the inauguration of the 1992 Games at the Olympic Stadium, not far from here.

The streets of Gràcia are preparing for a new edition of their main festival, which will offer more than 900 free activities from August 15 to 21.

The president of the Community of Madrid, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, assured this Thursday that the regional government will support the residents affected by the forest fire originated in Almorox (Toledo), once the evaluation of the damages caused by the fire to homes and plots is concluded.

The strike by forest firefighters in the Community of Madrid is causing the units of the 22 fire stations to have fewer personnel. Before, there was a unit with a truck and two or three forest firefighters in 19 stations. Now, none.

The National Police have solved the homicide of a 38-year-old man committed on New Year’s Day in the Madrid district of Usera with the arrest in Toledo and Navarra of four men, who apparently were known to the victim. The assaulted man died after receiving five stab wounds.

The spokesperson for the Vox parliamentary group in the Valencian Parliament, José María Llanos, emphasized this Thursday his party’s satisfaction with the first budgets that include national priority. The leader even clarified the statements made yesterday, at the end of the plenary session, by the Valencian president, Juanfran Pérez Llorca, who spoke of ‘roots’ instead of the concept defended by Vox. The head of the Consell pointed out that what the accounts do is “give that priority to those people who have been registered in a municipality for longer,” while adding: “They do not distinguish between skin color, they do not distinguish between immigrants and people born here. Of course not, I would never tolerate it.”

A couple consisting of a 28-year-old man and a 30-year-old woman has been arrested by the local police of Alicante for abandoning a girl just over two and a half years old. According to investigation sources, the intervention occurred last Tuesday at noon in a central car park in the capital after two passers-by observed the minor alone next to a car in manifestly unsanitary hygienic conditions.

La Sección Segunda de la Audiencia Provincial de Castellón ha impuesto una pena de prisión de 11 años por un delito continuado de agresión sexual a un hombre que sometió a su hija a diferentes prácticas sexuales cuando ésta era menor de edad.