Spain flood

[sunday]

Thanks, Leo. Nevertheless, I think that some of the planned civil works would have mitigated quite a bit the effects of the flood. See Figure 7 on page 8 of this document: http://www.ingenieriadelagua.com/2004/jia/jia2009/fs/AO15rev.pdf

Then, I've seen alleged messages from the national public body responsible of those rivers (Confederación Hidrográfica del Júcar) that gave the hourly flow rates with one zero less, i.e., an actual flow rate of 2,000m3/s as 200m3/s. That would be criminal negligence.

That guy has a lot of videos on Roman engineering, mostly hydraulic. I find his pronunciation a bit grrrrrrating, however. But his technical vocabulary is superb. See his video channel here.

I think this is one of his best videos:

 

Edited November 5 by sunday

[lucklucky]

Portuguese rescuers were also surprised they were the first to arrive to their location.

 

Sanchez the PM seems to be one of worst persons. Un canalla.

«Si necesitan más ayuda, que la pidan.»

[lucklucky]

Murcia 1879

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Teresa_flood

[sunday]

30 minutes ago, lucklucky said:

Un canalla.

Very much, yes.

[seahawk]

Very unlikely that any flow metering system would still work in such a flood.

[Leo Niehorster]

1 hour ago, sunday said:

... I find his pronunciation a bit grrrrrrating, ....

Well, as one who grew up speaking the Mexican version of Spanish, but having a Spanish teacher who — gratingly — spoke very correct Castilian, I find Sr. Gallo's accent pleasing.

 

Thanks for the link.

Leo

[Markus Becker]

On 11/4/2024 at 3:45 PM, sunday said:

Two planned sets of works that could have helped with the recent flood

http://www.ingenieriadelagua.com/2004/jia/jia2009/fs/AO15rev.pdf

https://www.chj.es/es-es/ciudadano/participacion_publica/Documents/Descripción de las actuaciones.pdf

There's allegations on X that flood protection had been dismantled in the name of re naturalization of the river. 

I take that's BS? 

 

PS: I see where the rumor comes from. The proposed but not actually implemented plan you asked about on the previous page. 

Edited November 5 by Markus Becker

[seahawk]

re-naturalisation actually improves flooding protection, as it delays the water flow and reduces the speed of a flash flood. It is normal that people do not get this and prefer their river and ramblas clean and made from concrete. Not much different to the reaction after the floods in 2021 in Germany.

[Markus Becker]

They specifically alleged that rain retention basins were filled in. 

WRT Germany, there were allegations that these dams inside the river that slow the flow and block movement of fish had been removed. But that also never made it past X so probably BS too. 

[sunday]

2 hours ago, Markus Becker said:

There's allegations on X that flood protection had been dismantled in the name of re naturalization of the river. 

I take that's BS? 

 

PS: I see where the rumor comes from. The proposed but not actually implemented plan you asked about on the previous page. 

Mostly BS, yes. Some small weirs, used basically for water abstraction to irrigation ditches, were removed, but those would have had no effect against floods.

Edited to add: Moreover, the brunt of the flood was caused by a ravine/arroyo system that is dry mostly of the time, thus it made no sense to dam it for irrigation purposes. Irrigation water in that zone comes from the Turia river, the one that was channeled in the 1960s and that has not flooded since.

The thing to do with those ravines/arroyos is to clean their beds, channel them, and provide alternative stream paths just before bottlenecks.

Edited November 5 by sunday

[seahawk]

The most important thing is too improve the durability of individual structures in risk areas and to teach the inhabitants how to behave in case of a flood. When the water reaches your door, it is not the time to save items from the cellar. You also want to move your main electrical installation to the first floor, so that power can be restored more easily after an event.

And general behaviour. If the road is flooded do not drive into the flooded area. If you are trapped in the car, leave it behind when the water reaches the underside of the door and run for higher ground. It was kind of comforting to see that Spanish people are equally good at ignoring road signs for "inundacion" as are the Germans for "Überflutungsgefahr".

[RETAC21]

49 minutes ago, seahawk said:

The most important thing is too improve the durability of individual structures in risk areas and to teach the inhabitants how to behave in case of a flood. When the water reaches your door, it is not the time to save items from the cellar. You also want to move your main electrical installation to the first floor, so that power can be restored more easily after an event.

And general behaviour. If the road is flooded do not drive into the flooded area. If you are trapped in the car, leave it behind when the water reaches the underside of the door and run for higher ground. It was kind of comforting to see that Spanish people are equally good at ignoring road signs for "inundacion" as are the Germans for "Überflutungsgefahr".

First, what is not practiced, doesn't exist - with no drills beyond tabletop exercises and scripted training exercises, this completely predictable flood (which, just with looking at the Med temperatures this year, was evident was going to happen) has caught the people in charge by surprise. 

Second, there's a normalization of deviance here, there's always a bit of flooding in this area (due to poorly built garages and it being a flood plain...) so people's reaction is to save anything that could be ruined by water, and the most expensive thing they have is their cars, so many rushed to the garages and were caught there by the sudden flood. As Sunday says, those in authority have been delaying the required works for years and even attempted to use the canalization works for further urban expansion (I shit you not)

Finally, our beloved leader has tried to use this disaster to his advantage, delaying the response and leaving those affected to their own means (in towns that vote socialist, go figure) and, unsurprisingly, has backfired. Now he's trying to get the national budget approved by adding the required reconstruction help included instead of using emergency legislation.

So with these people in charge and with these behaviors being taught, it's not surprising it has become a biblical catastrophe

[seahawk]

I have to disagree because construction of canals, building of dams or widening rivers only helps up to certain recurrence interval of an event. EU standard is a HQ100 event, so an event that has a 1% chance of happening in every year. The maps from the comunidad de Valencia about zonas with risk of inundacion look good. I would say they were as good prepared as everybody in the EU. But the rain was about the amount of rain in a year in 5 hours, no technical system will cope. Then you are looking at reducing the damage to structures and protecting the lives of the people.

That means preparing the infrastructure and buildings. Move outside of risk zones when possible, make them able to resist a flood as possible possible and finally reducing the damage if the water enters the building nevertheless. (avoid - resist - give in - strategy)

[sunday]

52 minutes ago, seahawk said:

But the rain was about the amount of rain in a year in 5 hours, no technical system will cope.

The new channel of the Turia river built as a result of the Plan Sur did cope. Brilliantly. Could have absorbed the excess flow from the ravine system that caused most of the damage in the last episode even in case of negligence about warnings, also.

There are 700 years of historical records of floods in the region. Moreover, there is a lot of know-how in Spain on canals, dams, and general hydraulic works. Political will could be missing from time to time, but the technical expertise is there.

[lucklucky]

Cronology

[sunday]

24 minutes ago, lucklucky said:

(...)

Cronology

Old video, made with incomplete information, mixing different watersheds, and by someone that has no deep knowledge of the matter, at best.

Pretty much superfluous.

[lucklucky]

Do you have one better?

[sunday]

13 minutes ago, lucklucky said:

Do you have one better?

I posted one better in this same thread already, made by a pro in the field, instead of by a run-of-the-mill, ignorant influencer that uses to vomit Wikipedia contents in his short videos.

 

Edited November 6 by sunday

[lucklucky]

That is geography and historical data not chronology.

[sunday]

50 minutes ago, lucklucky said:

That is geography and historical data not chronology.

Chronology does not matter very much, especially not a quite false and incomplete one, unless one is a fan of the current, horrible PM of Spain and thus has a hatchet to wield against the regional government.

For instance, that influencer does not mention the fact that the Confederación Hidrográfica del Júcar did not warn the regional goverment, that the CHJ reduced the level of the warnings thrice the day of the floods, that the CHJ reported flow rates that were 0.1 times the actual values, or that the CHJ had erased for a time from their web the flow records.

But the influencer tells in the video half truths about the alerts raised by the national government and the CHJ, claiming implicitly that all that they did was well done.

Well, the locals do not think so:

This Sánchez is a hero, according to that influencer.

Edited to add: Some comments from the regional governments:

https://www.eldebate.com/espana/comunidad-valenciana/20241104/mazon-denuncia-gobierno-desactivo-tres-veces-alerta-hidrologica-dia-catastrofe_241599.html

https://www.eldebate.com/espana/20241105/gobierno-page-senala-no-recibio-ningun-aviso-confederaciones-jucar-segura_242150.html

https://www.eldebate.com/espana/comunidad-valenciana/20241105/confederacion-jucar-borra-datos-criticos-caudal-poyo-plena-crisis-dana-valencia_242165.html

Edited November 6 by sunday

[RETAC21]

6 hours ago, seahawk said:

I have to disagree because construction of canals, building of dams or widening rivers only helps up to certain recurrence interval of an event. EU standard is a HQ100 event, so an event that has a 1% chance of happening in every year. The maps from the comunidad de Valencia about zonas with risk of inundacion look good. I would say they were as good prepared as everybody in the EU. But the rain was about the amount of rain in a year in 5 hours, no technical system will cope. Then you are looking at reducing the damage to structures and protecting the lives of the people.

That means preparing the infrastructure and buildings. Move outside of risk zones when possible, make them able to resist a flood as possible possible and finally reducing the damage if the water enters the building nevertheless. (avoid - resist - give in - strategy)

Seville used to have floods each 7 years, but the river was channeled away from populated areas and no more floods happened. What can be done is create dams to hold exceptional floods and alleviate the amounts downstream, and it works.

[lucklucky]

2 hours ago, sunday said:

Chronology does not matter very much, especially not a quite false and incomplete one, unless one is a fan of the current, horrible PM of Spain and thus has a hatchet to wield against the regional government.

For instance, that influencer does not mention the fact that the Confederación Hidrográfica del Júcar did not warn the regional goverment, that the CHJ reduced the level of the warnings thrice the day of the floods, that the CHJ reported flow rates that were 0.1 times the actual values, or that the CHJ had erased for a time from their web the flow records.

But the influencer tells in the video half truths about the alerts raised by the national government and the CHJ, claiming implicitly that all that they did was well done.

Well, the locals do not think so:

This Sánchez is a hero, according to that influencer.

Edited to add: Some comments from the regional governments:

https://www.eldebate.com/espana/comunidad-valenciana/20241104/mazon-denuncia-gobierno-desactivo-tres-veces-alerta-hidrologica-dia-catastrofe_241599.html

https://www.eldebate.com/espana/20241105/gobierno-page-senala-no-recibio-ningun-aviso-confederaciones-jucar-segura_242150.html

https://www.eldebate.com/espana/comunidad-valenciana/20241105/confederacion-jucar-borra-datos-criticos-caudal-poyo-plena-crisis-dana-valencia_242165.html

Thanks

[seahawk]

2 hours ago, RETAC21 said:

Seville used to have floods each 7 years, but the river was channeled away from populated areas and no more floods happened. What can be done is create dams to hold exceptional floods and alleviate the amounts downstream, and it works.

Define exceptional.

Statistically every 50 years, 100 years, 500 years, 1000 years...?

That alone is not solving it. In 2021 we had flooding here. One creek experienced a flooding event that was an event statistically likely to happen once in 1500 years, the other creek, 10 kilometres to the west, experienced a 50 year event that was mostly contained.

So yes, you can provide a protection to about the 100 year event, but it still means a bigger event can and will happen and that is where making the infrastructure resilient comes into play.

[Markus Becker]

3 hours ago, sunday said:

I posted one better in this same thread already, made by a pro in the field, instead of by a run-of-the-mill, ignorant influencer that uses to vomit Wikipedia contents in his short videos.

 

How do I switch subtitles from Spanish to something else?

[RETAC21]

12 minutes ago, seahawk said:

Define exceptional.

Statistically every 50 years, 100 years, 500 years, 1000 years...?

That alone is not solving it. In 2021 we had flooding here. One creek experienced a flooding event that was an event statistically likely to happen once in 1500 years, the other creek, 10 kilometres to the west, experienced a 50 year event that was mostly contained.

So yes, you can provide a protection to about the 100 year event, but it still means a bigger event can and will happen and that is where making the infrastructure resilient comes into play.

100 years would do, but of course, a Black swan event can happen, which goes back to my first point, emergencies need to be practised.