THE city of Zaragoza located in the northeastern region of Aragon, Spain was recently hit with raging flash floods due to a torrential downpour.
According to a report by Express, instead of sunny skies, the country had experienced rainy and stormy weather conditions in May, June, and July.
Several videos uploaded on Twitter depicted the gravity of the situation. Roads were blocked due to the flash flood and trapped cars, with their owners trapped in some before they were swept away by the strong current.
One video showed a woman perched on top of a car swept away by the flood waters, as a result of the downpour that lasted for a few hours. Thankfully, she was eventually rescued.
Due to these unprecedented weather conditions, Zaragoza had their tram services disrupted as well as bus routes in several neighbourhoods had to be shifted for an hour.
Local authorities had not reported any casualties or missing persons for now. However the city was left with widespread property damage.
Parque Venecia (Venecia Park) was recorded as one of the severely impacted areas with several people stranded in their vehicles, as stated in an alert by the Zaragoza City Council.
Besides the firefighters, divers from the fire brigade had to get involved with the rescue operation since the storm inflicted damage onto the autonomous city’s infrastructure, trapping individuals in their vehicles.
It is also noted that 12 individuals who were stranded in their vehicles or in trees taking cover from the floods were rescued as well as eight others including four minors from two homes were evacuated as a cautionary measure due to the flood water entering the homes.
It was reported that more than 200 rescue personnel, cleanup crews and police officers were deployed to deal with the storm’s aftermath.
According to Zaragoza’s mayor Natalia Chueca, within a span of ten minutes, the region witnessed an astonishing 20 litres of rainfall per square metre, which escalated to 56 litres per square metre within just one hour.
