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The rain in Spain claims four lives and causes chaos across south coast

The Local Spain
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The rain in Spain claims four lives and causes chaos across south coast
The town of Adra was among the worst affected. Photo: George Guerrero / AFP

UPDATED: Torrential rain caused massive flooding, closed roads and washed away vehicles across Spain's southern coast region and claimed the lives of four people in Andalusia.

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Villages and towns along Spain’s southern coast have been battling severe flooding this week after torrential rain swept across the region.

A 61-year-old man became the first fatality of the floods after his car was washed away in Polopos-La Mamola on Monday.

Later that afternoon the body of a man aged around 50 was discovered in Albuñol in Granada when flood water receeded.

On Tuesday morning a third victim was discovered washed up on a beach in Castell de Ferro, on the coast south of Granada. The man in his sixties was thought to have been carried down to the beach by flood water.

On Wednesday another victim was discovered washed up at the mouth of a river on nearby beach between Castell and Calahonda- The area had experienced 80 litres of rainfall per meter in just 40 minutes. 

More than 300 emergency calls were made across Malaga, Almeria and Jaén provinces on Monday afternoon alone. 

Spain's Civil Protection service had issued weather alerts for Valencia, Alicante, Granada and Almería along Spain's southeastern and southern coastline. 

One of the worst affected areas is the town of Adra, in Almería on Spain’s southeastern coast. Locals have uploaded videos to social media showing cars and trucks being washed away in the fast-flowing current.

Twitter user LauraSalPer is heard to exclaim "mi coche!" (my car!) in Spanish as she films her car being swept away down the street from an upstairs window. The tweet was retweeted by Spain’s InfoEmergencias emergency information service. 

 

Spain's national weather agency, Aemet,  on Monday put much of southeastern Spain at risk from storms, while there is an "important risk" in several areas along the country's southern coast, such as Malaga.

Roads were closed around Malaga airport, which was one of the worst affected areas on Monday afternoon.

Seven international flights were diverted from Malaga to Seville due to the heavy rain over Malaga, Europa Press. 

Tourists had been tweeting from the partially flooded Malaga airport, with Salva Tore joking "Start of the holidays, flooding at Malaga airport". 
Staff had to place plastic boxes around the airport's check-in area to try to catch the rain pouring into the building. 
Flooding has also been reported in the popular Costa Blanca resort of Benidorm, where several key roads were under water. 
 
Malaga airport had returned to normal by Tuesday morning with no reported delays.
 
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