The wind alert that the Catalan government sent to mobile phones on Wednesday afternoon was appropriate, because, judging by the injuries and damage caused by the wind, the suspension of classes and the recommendation to work from home surely prevented further tragedies. The image of the roof collapsing onto a music classroom where no children were present is chilling. From the Terres de l'Ebre and Lleida regions, accustomed to strong winds, there has been criticism that the areas to be alerted were not selected more precisely. However, considering the number of daily commutes from all over the country to the dense Barcelona metropolitan area, it was prudent for everyone to be warned of what could happen. The increasing reliability of weather forecasts facilitates accurate preventative decision-making. But the factor that politically frees governments from restricting normal life is the irresponsibility of the Mazón government during the 2024 DANA storm. On that criminal day, partly due to the president's absence, partly due to supposedly liberal ideological scruples, the alert was finally sent when most of the victims had already died. No government wants to be caught out.

This Monday at 10:00 AM, the phones of more than five million people rang simultaneously. Civil Protection sent a mass alert as part of an emergency drill to all mobile phones with coverage and connected to antennas in the Barcelonès, Baix Llobregat, Maresme, Vallès Oriental, and Vallès Occidental regions. This meant that it affected everyone in this area, including those passing through on the road or using public transport at the time of activation.

Suddenly, the phone emits a shrill sound, to which we were previously unfamiliar, and a text from the Generalitat Civil Protection appears, often accompanied by a danger signal with an exclamation point. The content of the message varies depending on the emergency: there is a fire nearby and you must stay indoors; downpours are forecast and it is recommended to avoid outdoor activities; there has been an accident that could cause a chemical cloud… This is the ES-Alert alert, which sends pop-up messages to all mobile phones within an area. It was recently sent to the vast majority of the Catalan population (37 of the 43 regions) due to the torrential rains in mid-July.

Catalonia is now in the darkest possible shade of red on the EU's contagio map. As every Thursday, the European Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (ECDC) has updated its contagion map of Europe of and, in a continent where green already predominates, Catalonia is one of the few regions that is in the maximum risk zone, that is to say, it registers over 500 contagions per 100,000 inhabitants over the past 14 days. The twenty-seven governments of the European Union agreed that it was necessary to "strongly" discourage travel to areas of this darker red, both in origin and at the destination.