Storm Adam floods seem to strand people on rooftops in eastern Spain as Valencia confines 145 municipalities

Storm Adam dumped torrential rain on Spain’s eastern coast on Monday, Oct. 19, flooding towns and leaving people waiting on rooftops for helicopters, Reuters and RTVE report. RTVE names the La Safor and Marina Alta districts, and its live page quotes government delegate Pilar Bernabé, on RNE, as saying the torrential rain caused a very complicated situation there during the early hours of Monday. Reuters says the floods killed at least two people. Valencia’s regional government then ordered residents of 145 municipalities to stay home, in an order published in its official gazette. This desk read the Reuters story in three reprints, on The Straits Times, WTVB and Devdiscourse, and found the same text in each; WTVB stamps it 6:27 AM Eastern time, or 3:27 AM PT.

Order 11/2026 of the regional Conselleria d’Emergències i Interior, signed by emergencies minister Juan Carlos Valderrama, tells authorities to “Mantindre, prolongar i incrementar les mesures adoptades de confinament”, maintaining, extending and increasing the stay-home and movement limits already in force, according to the Catalan-language text in the DOGV. It cites a meeting of the CECOPI emergency coordination center held at 07:00 on Oct. 19, exempts essential services and takes effect on publication. By this desk’s count, the order lists 78 municipalities on Valencia’s southern coast, among them Gandia, Oliva, Cullera and Alzira, and 67 on Alicante’s northern coast, among them Pego, Dénia, Xàbia and Els Poblets; the 112 service gives the total as 145. El Debate says Valderrama described the measures as in force “hasta nueva orden”, until further notice.

Valderrama spoke after the early-morning CECOPI meeting alongside Pilar Bernabé, the central government’s delegate in the region, Sur in English and RTVE report. RTVE, citing EFE, quotes him in Spanish: “No se puede circular, deben permanecer en sus casas, se están produciendo lluvias intensas y continuadas que están provocando inundaciones importantes en municipios como Pego, Oliva, Piles o Miramar”. Sur in English renders his words as “People must not travel; they must stay at home.” AFP, as carried by The Local, quotes him: “Road travel is impossible, you must stay at home,” and calls him the Valencia region’s emergency chief. The English versions differ, and this desk cannot tell whether they render one remark or several.

In Pego, Moll told À Punt that all access routes to the town stayed blocked and that even heavy-duty military vehicles could not move forward in some areas, Reuters reports. In an interview with COPE, he said the Guardia Civil “con medios de anfibios ha atendido a 17 personas”, and placed the worst trouble in homes around the Pego-Oliva marshland, a natural park. COPE also reports that 64 people left a campsite in Jávea (Xàbia) for the municipal shelter; Cadena SER says Alicante provincial firefighters cleared the El Naranjal campsite in Xàbia, and that Xàbia mayor Rosa Cardona told À Punt that more than a hundred people now stay at the town shelter.

In the coastal town of Oliva, deputy mayor Salvador Llopis told state broadcaster TVE that emergency crews kept rescuing trapped residents, especially older people with water up to their waists, Reuters reports. “They have to stay on top of tables and furniture to avoid getting wet,” he said. Oliva mayor Yolanda Pastor told Cadena SER that crews evacuated around 2,000 people staying at seven local campsites, according to Sur in English; COPE counts about a hundred people moved from one campsite in Oliva. The UME wrote on X that army troops and its Third Intervention Battalion ran rescues with an HU-27 helicopter in the Oliva area, in coordination with the Guardia Civil.

On the deaths, Reuters cites local officials as saying the bodies of two women who drowned turned up over the weekend, one washed up on a beach in Sagunto and the other swept away in Cabrera de Mar. Sur in English places the Sagunto death at Almardà beach on Sunday, after the woman entered rough seas with a male companion who reached the shore, and says rescuers recovered the Cabrera de Mar woman after a swollen stream carried her off on Saturday. AFP, via The Local, says firefighters in Catalonia reported the death of a woman who fell into a stream. RTVE’s live page and its news account on X later reported that the UME found a body in Oliva, raising the toll to three by RTVE’s count. Reuters, Sur and The Local had not reported a third death when this desk checked.

AEMET’s Valencia office recorded 131.9 l/m² in one hour on Oliva’s beach early Monday and 506.4 in the episode, it wrote on X at 6:56 AM Madrid time. About 40 minutes later it urged people in La Safor and around Pego to stay indoors, adding: “La situación meteorológica es extrema.” Reuters quotes AEMET as calling conditions “extremely adverse” and reports that rain in some areas topped 600 mm (24 inches) over 48 hours, the most since 1987. RTVE cites 651 l/m² at the Forna station and peaks of 700 in the hardest-hit spots, while Cadena SER, citing Avamet for the 48 hours to 10:00 Monday, lists Forna at 720, Pego 693, Oliva 643 and Real de Gandia 615.

AEMET held a red warning until 10:00 Monday on Alicante’s northern coast and Valencia’s southern coast, Cadena SER reports, then moved Valencia’s southern coast to orange. In a later post the agency wrote: “Aunque ha pasado la fase más crítica del temporal de lluvias torrenciales, la situación meteorológica sigue siendo adversa.” It said the orange warning on the Valencia coast runs until 14:00, with yellow warnings for the rest of the day. Sur in English says AEMET kept amber alerts for Barcelona, Girona, Tarragona and the Balearic Islands with heavy rain expected to move north into Catalonia.

Incident counts differ by time window and source. Cadena SER reports 709 incidents from 13:57 on Saturday to 07:30 on Monday, 377 of them in Alicante and 327 in Valencia, with Oliva at 172 and Xàbia at 113. TodoAlicante counts 781 overnight, and RTVE reports close to 800. RTVE’s live page later quotes Valderrama on 1,249 incidents, most of them in Alicante province. RTVE says the Girona and Vernisa rivers and the Beniopa ravine burst their banks; Cadena SER reports that Renfe suspended the C1 and C2 commuter rail lines and that 22 roads stayed closed in Valencia province, citing the DGT traffic authority.

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez wrote on X at 8:56 AM Madrid time: “Situación muy complicada en la Comunitat Valenciana, especialmente en el litoral sur de Valencia y norte de Alicante, ante las intensas lluvias de las últimas horas.” He said the UME had deployed and that rescues continued in hard-to-reach areas. AFP, as carried by The Local, renders part of the post as “Rescue operations are continuing in areas that are difficult to access. People are urged to avoid all travel,” and Reuters says the central government deployed emergency units from the military and the national police. Regional president Juanfran Pérez Llorca asked people waiting in their homes for rescue to stay patient, RTVE reports.

The storm also hit the Balearic Islands, RTVE reports. Its live page, citing EFE, reports road closures and shut public facilities on Ibiza and Formentera, where the red alert has dropped to yellow. On Sunday the UME wrote on X that units of its Third Battalion left their Valencia base to sail for Ibiza and Mallorca. Sur in English says Catalonia’s government activated level-2 emergency protocols.

The floods come ten days before the second anniversary of the 2024 floods, RTVE notes, and RTVE’s Radio 5 says the Valencia region relives a nightmare; Reuters says those earlier floods killed more than 230 people in the region. Reuters writes that meteorologists say human-driven climate change makes such extreme weather more frequent and destructive. Transport Minister Óscar Puente called what has happened along the Mediterranean side almost without pause for a month “la cara visible de la emergencia climática”, Cadena SER reports. AEMET’s Valencia office, for its part, wrote: “No es la primera vez que pasa”.

Still open as of this update: whether officials confirm the Oliva death RTVE reported, how many people rescuers lifted from roofs and homes, when the CECOPI lifts the confinement, and the damage to homes, roads and the citrus harvest that Cadena SER says farm groups fear in La Marina Alta and La Safor.

Correction · Oct 19, 2026, 7:08 AM PT: An earlier version of this story credited the overnight timing and the La Safor and Marina Alta district names in its opening sentence to Reuters and RTVE jointly. Reuters names neither district and gives no overnight timing; RTVE’s article names the districts, and RTVE’s live page carries the early-hours timing, from government delegate Pilar Bernabé. This desk now credits each detail to the outlet that carries it.