The Hydrographic Confederation of Júcar (CHJ) I missed 15 alerts on the flow of the Poyo ravine during the key hour and a half of the October 29 flood.
The Confederation’s internal protocols establish, in a “redundant” manner, according to its own workers, that a communication must be sent by e-mail at the Emergency Center when the flow of the Poyo ravine exceeds 150 m3/s.
This happened at 5:25 p.m. on the 29th, however, the email was only sent to report the rapid increase in flow. 6:43 p.m.. In other words, the SAIH (Automatic Hydrological Information Systems) technicians took one hour and 18 minutes to give the opinion.
Official data on the flow of the Poyo ravine establishes that there have been 15 measurements above 150 m3/s, of which the alerts were not processed by the technicians of the Hydrographic Confederation of Júcar.
The flow meters of the Poyo ravine send real-time data every five minutes. In almost an hour and a half that it took for the Confederation to send the emergency alert, the river bed had already overflowed and was close to 2,000 m3/s. This value is equivalent to four times the flow of the Ebro and 53 times that of the Tagus-Segura.
According to the Generalitat Valenciana, there has been no more written or verbal communication on the Poyo ravine than the e-mail sent by a technical assistant from the Confederation.
The Integrated Operational Coordination Center (CECOPI) met from 5:00 p.m., with the telematic presence of the President of the Confederation Júcar, Miguel Polo. However, the participants’ concern focused on a possible overflowing of the Forata dam.
The internal protocol of the Confederation indicates that, in the case of the Poyo ravine, the information is provided by e-mail to the competent authorities when its flow rate exceeds 150 m3/s. This was done precisely at 12:07 this morning of October 29, while the flow had increased to 264 m3/s at 11:40.
On this first occasion, the Júcar Confederation it took 27 minutes from the moment you obtain the data and sending the email.
In the afternoon, with the flood which caused deaths, this same alert concerning the flow of the ravine only reached the emergency room one hour and 18 minutes after the maximum alert threshold has been exceeded.
Graph with the evolution of the flow of the Rambla del Poyo and the alerts sent by the system and the Hydrographic Confederation of Júcar.
In other words, in an identical procedure, the CHJ technical assistant responsible for the flow of the Poyo ravine took almost an hour longer to warn.
Two technicians, two performances
Behind him e-mail At 12:07 p.m., the Generalitat launched a hydrological alert and informed the municipalities concerned to take appropriate measures.
The CHJ sent three other emails, in these cases, to report that the flow had decreased and was outside the limits considered dangerous. These emails They were sent at 1:42 p.m. (120 m3/s), at 3:04 p.m. (55 m3/s) and at 4:13 p.m. (28.7 m3/s).
All were sent by the same technician from the Hydrographic Confederation of Júcar. This worker goes by the initials CBI and the internal identification at_extchj490.
However, the e-mail at 6:43 p.m. late warning of the deadly flood was sent by another technical assistant which served the Automatic Hydrological Information System (SAIH), whose initials are CGG and whose internal identification responded to at_extchj243.
EL ESPAÑOL asked the Hydrographic Confederation of Júcar if there was a shift change during these two and a half hours between 4:13 p.m. and 6:43 p.m. during which there was no communication to the emergency department regarding Poyo Ravine.
The CHJ did not respond. She also did not provide the number of people who were in the SAIH room on the afternoon of Tuesday October 29, nor did she answer whether there were technical assistants who were teleworking, instead of being present in the room in person. He stressed, however, that the president, Miguel Polo, was present in the building when he met electronically with CECOPI.
However, Polo was not in the SAIH room and was in an office with the CHJ members who were participating in CECOPI.
Responsibility of the CHJ
The SAIH room, as shown in the images published by EL ESPAÑOL, has three giant screens where data appears in real time. One of video wall It is dedicated to the rainfall network, another to the communication system and a third to meters and sensors.
One of the real-time precipitation and flow control panels in the SAIH room of the Hydrographic Confederation of Júcar.
Real-time monitoring of rainfall data and river beds is the responsibility of the SAIH.
According to the Special Plan against the risks of Floods, updated by the Socialist Government Ximo Puig In 2021, the Hydrographic Confederation of Júcar has the obligation “to inform the Emergency Coordination Center of the Generalitat de relevant increases in flows occurring in rivers and ravines of their respective basins.
Said Particular Plan specifies the functions and obligations of this organization, dependent on the Ministry of Ecological Transition which it directs. Therese Ribera.
Among these actions is “recommend to the Planning Department the activation of Hydrological Emergency Alert 0 in the municipalities of the basin concerned, taking into account the possibility of flooding in these areas”.
It is also the obligation of the Júcar Confederation “to present to the CCE of the Generalitat the data that describe the hydrological and hydraulic state and the expected evolution of the basins affected by the pre-emergency declaration, with the periodicity that the Planning Department deems necessary depending on the seriousness of the situation.
Finally, the Special Plan also specifies that it is up to the CHJ to “inform the Government Delegation or Subdelegation”.
The Generalitat of Carlos Mazon sent a press release this Thursday afternoon highlighting precisely these powers and responsibilities of the Confederation.
Between 4:13 p.m. and 6:43 p.m., there was no communication from the Confederation to the Emergency Department regarding the Poyo ravine canal. Both emails that he sent between these hours simply corresponded to precipitation collected by the Chiva rain gauge.
It turns out that the emails on the data obtained in the rain gauge network It is sent automatically by the systemwithout the intervention of a SAIH technician.
Instead, alerts concerning river beds and ravines must be “validated” by a worker of the Confederation “before being sent” to the emergency room.
The Júcar Confederation has three thresholds for the flow of the Poyo ravine or alert levels to inform emergencies. The first of them, the weakest, when the flow exceeds 30 m3/s. Intermediate is when this value exceeds 70 m3/s. Finally, the most serious alert occurs when the river bed has a flow rate greater than 150 m3/s.
It is for this reason that there are three emails of the Confederation warning of the reduction in flow. One for each alert threshold.
However, there was also no communication when, from 4:15 p.m., the flow exceeded the first alert level, nor when from 5:00 p.m., the level exceeded 70 m3/s.
The Confederation’s alerts went directly from 28 m3/s at 4:13 p.m. to 1,687 m3/s at 6:43 p.m., while It was already difficult to avoid disaster in certain communities crossed by the ravine. over its 43.5 kilometers in length.
