Salomé Pradas and the Fire Chief stopped the ES-Alert dispatch at 6 pm
The warning was intended for the municipalities affected by the possible collapse of the Forata reservoir, but not for those affected by the overflow of the Poio ravine.
ValenciaThe Deputy Director General of Emergencies for the Valencian Regional Government, Jorge Suárez, confirmed this morning in statements to the investigating judge that on the day of the DANA storm, he had already proposed the use of ES-Alert on two occasions before 6:00 PM. Specifically, between 5:10 PM and 5:15 PM, and again at 5:38 PM. This information was obtained by ARA from sources present during his testimony. This data corroborates the information provided by... other witnesses present at the Cecopio and by the videos of the meeting which have been gradually incorporated into the case. In fact, according to the official's testimony to the magistrate, he had finished a message at 5:45 p.m. The draft asked residents to move to the higher ground of their homes—advice that was omitted from the first SE-Alert sent, but included in the second. It was a warning about the possible collapse of the Forata reservoir, which regulates the Magro River, but not about the situation in the Poio ravine, whose overflow was responsible for the vast majority of deaths.
The alert was not disseminated at that time due to concerns raised by the then-head of the Fire Consortium, José Miguel Basset, now retired, who feared the message would cause widespread alarm and requested that the text be reviewed by communications experts. Faced with this debate, at 6:00 PM, the then Minister of Justice and the Interior, Salomé Pradas, decided to suspend the online meeting—through which representatives of state agencies were participating—and continue only in person with the leaders present at the Emergency Coordination Center located in the town of Eliana. This arrangement lasted for an hour.
This browser does not support the video element.
Linguistic changes
During the time the meeting was held entirely in person, Suárez instructed the head of the 112 analysis unit, Juan Ramón Cuevas, to prepare the procedure and draft the text in a word processing document. It was already 6:15 p.m. The messages were ready by 6:38 p.m., and the technician entered them into the ES-Alert computer system. But it was at that moment that Pradas, the regional secretary for Emergencies, Emilio Argüeso, and the director general of Emergencies, Alberto Martín Moratilla, halted the process because they believed the mayors of the affected municipalities needed to be notified first. Another reason that delayed the dissemination of the alert was the former regional minister's doubts about her legal authority to decree a lockdown. In fact, according to Suárez, Pradas requested that the phrase "any travel is requested to be suspended" be changed to "please avoid…" to avoid sounding like an imposition. Similarly, the former regional minister and Vicent Mompó, president of the Valencia Provincial Council, also requested linguistic changes. These included removing the accent mark from the name of the province of Valencia, replacing "tipo" with "tipo," and "este" with "este." All of these changes were intended to eliminate forms that the People's Party (PP) considers overly formal, closer to Eastern Catalan, and far removed from the language used by the general public.
This browser does not support the video element.
Concern over the Forata reservoir and debates about the ES-Alert text led to the situation of the Poio ravine being overlooked, whichIt was overflowing from 6 pm onwardsThe oversight occurred even though between 5 and 6 pm alone, 112 received 2,438 calls alerting them to the situation. Overwhelmed,The technicians did not warn their superiors about the disastrous situation on the riverbank.which, at 18:43 h, the Júcar River Basin Authority had also warned them about throughan email–Information on river flow and rainfall could also be accessed online in real time–. At the Cecopio (Emergency Coordination Center), they weren't aware of what was happening until after 7:00 p.m., when the first images and phone calls from mayors began arriving. This forced them to postpone sending the alert because it was necessary to expand its coverage area. The warning was finally broadcast at 8:11 p.m., but with incorrect information. It asked people to avoid travel, but not to stay home and in higher areas, as a second message did at 8:57 p.m.
Suárez explained why the Emergency Services technicians did not consult the Confederation's real-time data. He stated that the staff typically only read the emails sent by the hydrographic agency. However, during his testimony a month ago, the head of analysis and monitoring for Emergency Services, Juan Ramón Cuevas, affirmed that the email alerting them to the extraordinary flow of the Poio ravine at 6:43 p.m. was not forwarded to the Cecopio (Emergency Coordination Center) because five members of the Confederation were present at the meeting. Another point Suárez addressed was the end—around 2:30 p.m.—of the firefighters' monitoring of the ravines, including the Poio ravine. According to the Deputy Director General of Emergency Services, his department did not authorize the demobilization of the personnel, which had been requested that morning. Regarding the firefighters, he also stated that he believes he recalls their chief, José Miguel Basset, having already reported the removal of some bodies starting at 8:30 p.m.
[We are working to expand this information]