A second body has been found in Sant Quintí de Mediona at the site where a father and son disappeared.

San Quintín de Mediona (Alt Penedès)The Generalitat Fire Brigade located a second body at noon this Monday in the Sant Quintí de Mediona area, in the Alt Penedès region, where a man and his minor son disappeared on Sunday. The family car they were traveling in was swept away by the rising water level of the Mediona stream due to the storm that affected much of the country. On Sunday night, emergency services were already The minor's body was found in the Bolos River, in Sant Pere de Riudebitlles, and now they suspect that this second body may be that of the father. "The evidence is quite consistent with it being the person we were looking for, but we must wait for identification," explained Fire Department Sub-Inspector Guillem Amorós.

The incident occurred around six in the evening when the man and the minor were driving along a road towards the Monterrey residential area in the same municipality and were surprised by the rising water of the stream, which swept the car with the father and son inside. "It's the stream where the grandmothers always say we should watch out when we pass," explains one of the residents of Sant Quintí, who also admits that normally everyone passes through without fear because it's almost always dry or with less than a foot of water.

The problem is that, as the firefighters explained, on Sunday afternoon, due to downpours, the stream was up to three meters deep. This amount of water, combined with the virulence (the water reached 60 cubic meters per second), also led the firefighters to find the minor's body yesterday 6 km from where they had found the car he was traveling in.

However, the body found this Monday, which a priori could be the father's, was only 800 meters from where the vehicle began to slide and next to where the firefighters had set up the command center, in the Sant Quintí de Mediona pavilion. About fifteen relatives of the victims had also traveled to the site. Some relatives, feeling helpless while waiting and the fact that the command post was very close to the river, took turns approaching the water throughout the morning to try to find any clues to find the missing man.

It wasn't until shortly after 1:00 p.m. that officers located the body. Given the proximity of the place where they found him, the relatives quickly learned of the situation and went to the riverbed to identify the man.

17 km of searching

Despite the proximity to the location from which the search was being organized, the victim's body had not been located because it had been left "in a reedy area and half buried." In fact, the rapidity with which the waters fell in the area last night meant that this morning firefighters had to re-combine the entire area, which had already been inspected the night before, with underwater personnel, drones, forest rangers to clear brush, dogs from the Canine Investigation Group, and a helicopter for each helicopter.

The improved weather conditions and the drastic reduction in the river's flow—some underwater agents claim that 12 hours earlier the river had three times as much water as this morning—have allowed emergency services to inspect the area meter by meter to reach the area. It has also made it possible for the EPAF units of the forest rangers to clear areas of the riverbed that until then had been covered in water and were impassable. However, the search has extended to 17 km (six of which were already combed on Sunday and eleven that were worked on this Monday) between the Duc torrent, which flows next to Sant Quintí de Mediona, and its mouth in the Anoia River, about ten kilometers away.

The territorial delegate of the Penedès regional government, Lluís Valls, also traveled to the scene and asked for patience while the identification work is carried out. He also defended the fact that an ES-Alert alert was not sent to the area on Sunday. "It is another method of communicating alerts that is activated when the conditions are much more localized in a specific location. Yesterday was a very widespread incident that had been reported," he insisted.

President Salvador Illa also expressed his condolences in a message on social media, in which he announced that "unfortunately, rescue teams have found the lifeless body of the second person missing due to the rain in Catalonia" and urged citizens to exercise caution and responsibility.