‘There’s so much confrontation’: Valencians sick of political bickering after Spain’s floods

A sense of powerlessness lingers in Chiva a week after the flood. Photograph: Bruna Casas/Reuters

Everyone in Chiva has their own memories of what happened here a week ago. For some it is the frantic phone calls to loved ones; for others, the disbelief as this small Valencian town, like so many others, was swallowed up by flood waters that bore away cars and trees as if they were paper boats.

For Lourdes Vallés, it is the sound of a car horn sounding through the sodden darkness of last Tuesday night.