Twelve people died and four are missing after Storm Gloria hit Spain from Sunday to Thursday. This was announced on Friday by Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, attributing these extreme bad weather to climate change.
During a visit to the Fitur tourism fair in Madrid, the head of government expressed his "solidarity with the families of the twelve dead and the four missing". He stressed that the country is deploying "all the material and human resources to locate them as quickly as possible".
The previous assessment, according to local authorities, was eleven dead attributed to the Gloria storm, which hit mainly the east of the country and the Mediterranean coast.
"More rain in a day than in a year"
"The sea has advanced three kilometers inland in the Ebro Delta (a protected natural park in Catalonia)," said Pedro Sanchez. "In some places, more rain fell in one day than we expect for the whole year."
The Ebro Delta in Spain was particularly affected by the Gloria storm.
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez points to #climate changehttps: //t.co/oO26On48lQ pic.twitter.com/a6fbxJv2eg
"It is the seventh great storm that we have known since the start of the storm season" and they are "more and more devastating", he added to underline that Spain is particularly exposed to climate change.
His government promised Tuesday to introduce an energy transition bill to fight global warming in the "first 100 days" of his mandate, before the end of April.
12.5 million euros in damage in Barcelona
The city hall of Barcelona communicated Friday a first assessment of the damage, which would reach "12.5 million euros" in the second city of Spain. "On average, the nine beaches in the city have lost 30% of sand," according to the city's press release, which evokes the effect of waves having "exceeded six meters in height".
The mayor of Barcelona, Ada Colau, asked the state to recognize the state of "natural disaster" for this area. For the region of Valencia (south-east) alone, the union of young farmers Asaja estimated the losses for the agricultural sector at “62.6 million euros”.
