Death toll has risen to at least 213. An evangelical couple shares how they rely on the Lord after losing everything in the flood.
Cars pile up in a muddy street in Catarroja, a few kilometres south of Valencia / Twitter @inmux
Rain from the flood has overflowed streams and ravines in multiple municipalities in southeastern Spain, killing at least 213 people. Dozens are still missing in what is considered one of the deadliest storms in Europe.
While the rescue work continues, different testimonies of people who have survived the catastrophe are being shared on social media.
Some evangelicals have also shared their experience of what they have experienced, explaining that they have lost everything or that the water has damaged the premises of their congregation.
That is the case of Yolanda and Lory, a married couple from the Comunidad Cristiana Valentia church in Valencia , who told how "God saved Lory's life".
Lory had been trapped in a tree when the flood reached the municipality of Catarroja where he was. He was finally rescued by a neighbour.
"He was caught by the rising water and, along with a young man, they climbed a tree until a neighbour saw them and rescued them with a ladder that they mounted on the roof of a car. They climbed from there to a first-floor balcony”, explains Yolanda Salvador, Lory's wife.
"I was almost two hours without hearing from him and seeing the fury of the water rise up to two metres”, she adds.
Once on that balcony, "they saw that a truck had swept away the car where they had put the ladder. It also uprooted the tree they had climbed. Once again we have seen the Lord's mercy at work”.
The story of how Lory was able to save his life brings comfort to this septuagenarian couple, although they also report great material losses.
“We are 73 years old and this has been quite an ordeal for our age. We have lost both our cars, one of them our taxi, the only livelihood we had. We have been 18 hours without electricity and without water for drinking or cooking”.
Yolanda also recalls how they experienced the drought from Catarroja, a town just a few kilometres from Valencia, which, among other things, saw a railway bridge collapse. So far, the city council has confirmed that 15 people have died.
“The waters entered the town with unusual fury, sweeping away everything it could find. The streets were flooded with two metres of water, mud and rain”, she points out.
Furthermore, “not a single business remained open and we woke up to see hundreds of cars piled up on top of each other in a dreadful image, when the water level had dropped”.
Although in the first few hours they were “cut off and without internet”, as the hours went by they were recovering basic services.
“We are facing another night with cold, mud and homes that have lost everything. We do not know the number of dead”, says this 73-year-old woman, for whom her faith in Jesus is key in the face of all that she has experienced.
“God will provide for us, strengthen us and give us comfort”, concludes Yolanda.
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