Málaga evacuates thousands as more flood alerts issued

Thousands of people have been evacuated from their homes in the Costa del Sol region of southern Spain after a red weather alert was issued for extreme rain and flooding.

Spain’s Civil Protection Agency sent a mass alert to phones in Málaga province after 22:00 local time (21:00 GMT) on Tuesday evening warning of a “extreme risk of rainfall”.

The area, including the tourist resorts of Marbella, Velez and Estepona, is expected to take the brunt of the extreme weather phenomenon known as a “Dana”.

Several other regions in Spain remain on alert as the new weather front is expected to bring torrential rain and low temperatures just weeks after the country was devastated by flash floods that have so far killed more than 220 people.

Catalonia in north-eastern Spain, particularly the coast near Tarragona, has also been placed on red alert until Wednesday evening.

Schools in the entire southern province of Málaga have been closed while many supermarkets have kept shutters down.

Around 3,000 people living in close proximity to the Guadalhorce River have been told to leave their homes, the Regional Government of Andalusia has said.

Regional government’s Minister of the Presidency Antonio Sanz said: “We have not evacuated entire towns, but rather specific areas linked to the riverbank.

“This decision has been communicated to the government of Spain in order to receive collaboration from the state security forces and bodies.”

In other parts of Spain precautions are being taken – with eastern and southern Mediterranean areas the most vulnerable.

Spain’s meteorological agency Aemet has placed parts of the Valencia and Andalusia regions, as well as the Balearic Islands, on orange alert from now until Thursday.

Aemet warns of rainfall and storms that could be “very strong to torrential”.

That orange alert is the second highest and it signals a significant meteorological event “with a degree of danger for normal activities”.

In Valencia, school classes and sports activities suspended in some areas and sandbags piled up to protect the centre of the town of Aldaia.

However this second Dana weather system is not expected to be as dramatic as the red alert on 29 October, when the Valencia region in particular suffered an unprecedented loss of lives and material damage.

Elsewhere, rescue teams searching for the bodies of two young brothers who were swept away in the Valencia floods two weeks ago said their bodies had been found.

Izan Matías, 5, and Rubén Matías, 3, were pulled from their father Victor Matías’s arms when the torrent ripped through their home in Valencia on the evening of 29 October.

Their aunt Barabara Sastre confirmed to the BBC the boys had been found. Their bodies were recovered in different locations.

“My little angels, we have finally found you” one family friend, David Garcia, wrote online. “Two stars shine brighter in the sky.”

Yesterday, search teams had focused on part of the River Pollo about 6km (3.7km) from the family home.

The boys’ uncle Iván had told the BBC he was hugely grateful for all the support they had received and hoped his nephews would be found.

Volunteers from the Canary Islands and other parts of Spain had joined recovery specialists from Mexico, who normally work in the aftermath of earthquakes.

On Monday, the family dog was found dead in a garage in the town of Paiporta, more than 12km (7.4 miles) from their house in La Curra, a neighbourhood of Mas del Jutge.

Dana weather systems are formed when an area of low pressure gets “cut off” from the main flow of the jet stream.

This means that instead of moving through a region relatively quickly, they get blocked over the same area leading to persistent rainfall for several days.

Colder air high in the atmosphere meets warmer air flowing in from the Mediterranean which intensifies the storm.