Handfuls of mud were thrown at the Spanish king and queen by hundreds of protesters in Valencia who chanted “murderers, murderers”, as the region continues to reel from deadly floods which have killed at least 217 people.
Anger and frustration has been mounting among residents over what has been widely perceived as delayed alerts from the authorities about the severity of Tuesday’s heavy rainfall, which triggered “tsunami-style” flooding.
“It was known and nobody did anything to avoid it,” a young man told the king, who insisted on staying to talk to people despite the turmoil, while the prime minister Pedro Sanchez had quickly withdrawn.
It comes as fears grow that large numbers of bodies remain trapped underwater – including in the entirely submerged underground car park of Bonaire shopping centre, one of the largest in Spain.
Specialist scuba divers are now searching for bodies in the car park, after it was reported that a number of shoppers had “ignored” advice from security guards to abandon their vehicles.
“No one knows for sure how many people there might still be down there,” said Eduardo Martinez, who works in the centre.
At one point in the visit to the stricken suburb of Paiporta, where more than 60 people have died, King Felipe held a man who was crying on his shoulder.
Online footage showed his wife, Letizia, crying as she hugged some residents. Her hair and face had traces of mud and one of her bodyguards had blood on his face, apparently from a hurled object.
Bodyguards had opened umbrellas to try to protect the royals, in what has been described as an unprecedented scene which saw the Spanish royals embedded among the volatile crowd.
While the prime minister has said the time will come to examine the action taken in the future, a blame game is already underway.
The central government has said issuing alerts to the population is the responsibility of regional authorities. The Valencia authorities have said they acted as best as they could with the information available to them.
Mr Sanchez said on Saturday that any potential negligence would be investigated later and called for political unity in the face of the tragedy.
Valencia’s regional leader, Carlos Mazon, who also visited Paiporta to boos and insults from protesters, posted on X, formerly Twitter: “I understand the public anger and of course I will stay to receive it. It is my political and moral obligation. The King’s attitude this morning has been exemplary.”
The death toll from the country’s worst flash floods in modern history edged higher to 217 on Sunday – almost all in the Valencia region.
Dozens of people were still unaccounted for, while some 3,000 households still had no electricity, officials said.
Thousands of additional soldiers and police officers joined the disaster relief effort over the weekend in the largest such peacetime operation in Spain. On Saturday, it was announced that a further 5,000 soldiers and an additional 5,000 police officers would join the rescue and clean-up operation.
The floods engulfed streets and lower floors of buildings, and swept away cars and chunks of masonry in tides of mud.
The tragedy is already Europe’s worst flood-related disaster in a single country since 1967 when at least some 500 people died in Portugal.
Scientists say extreme weather events are becoming more frequent in Europe, and elsewhere, due to climate change. Meteorologists think the warming of the Mediterranean, which increases water evaporation, plays a key role in making torrential rains more severe.
