The third vice president and minister for the Ecological Transition, Teresa Riberadefended this Tuesday the role played by the AEMET and the Júcar Hydrographic Confederation (CHJ) on October 29 when it came to notifying and informing the authority responsible for the emergency by DANA, the Valencian Generalitat, so that it could act, but in the detailed listing of its notifications it has also admitted that among the messages that In the afternoon of that day they reported a drop in the flow of the Albaida and Magro rivers and, at 6:43 p.m., the final flooding of the Poyo ravine that led to its overflowing There was “little” time to react, about 45 minutes.
“There was never an information blackout”Ribera stated in his appearance in Congress to give explanations of the actions of the agencies dependent on his Ministry, 21 days later and in response to the accusation that the Valencian president launched to the contrary, Carlos Mazón the same day of the tragedy.
“Of the seven messages (that the CHJ sent throughout the afternoon to the Generalitat (of Poyo). If the intense rain accumulates upstream it ends downstream. “It is that moment where there is room, just a little, 45 minutes, to react,” Ribera said about a series of messages in which there were also three that warned of a decline of the flows at the head of the rivers, which ended up overflowing further downstream. “The waters that are recorded upstream are those that are used to determine the growth of downstream flows, the reaction time is very limited and early warning systems are the only ones that save lives“, he added about the alarm that the Generalitat should have sent to the population sooner.
As Ribera explained, between 12:07 and 16:03 on October 29, the CHJ sent the Valencian Generalitat the first of the three notifications about “descending flow”, “which was essentially explained by the most important notice, by the pause in rainfall at the headwaters”. The last email, at 6:43 p.m., reported, either way or not, a flow increase of 1,600 meters per second, “four times the average flow of the Ebro at its mouth”, which was taken “downstream”, at the station. of the CHJ in Ribarroja.
“I find it deeply unfair and dangerous to prepare for what we are already facing,” he said about the criticism of the work of the AEMET and the CHJ and thanked “the work and dedication of the public servants, who issued the information as such.” and as was his duty,” he said. On the contrary, Ribera has insisted that the emergency command and the Civil Protection command, the Generalitat, were the ones who did not act appropriately. “It is of little use if the person who has to respond does not know how to do it,” he stressed.
“The pertinent question is whether the appropriate information and alerts were produced. From the data it is clear that yes and through multiple channels throughout the day,” said the vice president, who has given a detailed account of all the notices, emails and phone calls from the AEMET and the CHJ to the Generalitat, to warn of rains and consequences that not only far exceeded what was expected but also all existing risk analyses. Including two calls from the AEMET in Valencia to the Civil Protection of the Generalitat at 11:26, 11:36 and in the opposite direction, at 11:51 in which the record is that “they cannot be heard” and “they hang up”.
“The DANA of October 29 distances itself from high-medium probability scenarios with a recurrence capacity of 100 years or low probability with returns of 500 years,” he said about the models that exist today to measure risk. . “The intensity was such that in a single hour 184 liters per meter fell at the Turís station, a historical record for stations in the AEMET network.” “To give you an idea, more water accumulated in three hours than normally falls in a year,” Ribera emphasized.
Faced with this situation of historic rains, Ribera recalled that the red warning issued by the AEMET at 7:36 on October 29 was as extraordinary as “in the last five years, only one in every 400 warnings for rain and floods has been red.” “. “This is undoubtedly the most relevant notice in the entire information chain to be able to provide an early response and identify the most appropriate measures to protect the population.” It was the continuation of those that the AEMET had launched in previous days, since on October 24 it warned about DANA and which, as he recalled, led to the University of Valencia deciding to suspend classes the day before and the Valencia Provincial Council and up to 62 municipalities will paralyze their activities and take measures.
“They were very complicated hours in which the CHJ kept CECOPI up to date and in real time made the relief decisions to avoid overflowing and breaking of swamps,” said Ribera, who specifically highlighted that the technicians of the basin managed to release peaks of 1,100 meters per second during the afternoon and night of October 19, “double the average relief capacity” so that the dam did not break.
On the Poyo Rambla, Ribera has defended that throughout the day the CHJ provided data recording forecasts and warnings of flow variations, with which at 12:20 the CECOPI activated the water alert in the riverine municipalities to advise The population does not approach rivers and ravines. “An alert that fortunately was never deactivated by the Generalitat,” said Ribera, who added that “it was also not updated.”