The first thing is the people, whose faces still reflect the fear and sadness that DANA left on October 29 and 30 passing through places like Letur (Albacete), but then comes the infrastructure and other real estate, as houses and other public and private buildings destroyed due to the flood, some of great heritage value and included in the historic ensemblecategory held by the municipality.
In this small municipality of just over 900 inhabitants in the Sierra del Segura, the numerous damages suffered by these buildings are still being assessed, many of them in the old town, which has left at least 13 buildings destroyed, 22 damaged and 33 possibly affected. A situation that led the government of Castile-La Mancha to ask the Central Executive this week for Membership of Letur in the National Plan for Risk and Emergency Management in the Field of Cultural Heritageas has already been done in other cases, such as in the case of the La Palma volcano.
This was announced during its press conference after the Governing Council by the spokesperson of the Governing Body, Esther Padilla, who indicated that the request was made by letter from the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sports to the Ministry of Culture“so that an assessment of the damage can be carried out as quickly as possible and future solutions to this disaster can be sought.”
The fundamental objective of the National Emergency and Risk Management Plan for Cultural Heritage is the study and development of methods of analysis, prevention, intervention and recovery to guarantee the integrity of cultural heritage in emergency situations, as explained by Padilla, who indicated that it is an instrument of heritage management, shared by different administrations and with the participation of other public entities, as well as specialists in different subjects.
From now on, as announced by the Council spokesperson, two phases are beginning. The first of these concerns the assessment of material damage in Letur, for which there will be a multidisciplinary technical advisory team of the Cultural Heritage Institute of Spain. And, secondly, he referred to the phase of reconstruction of material damage, which is why “funding channels are open to obtain financial aid, for example, through the 2% Cultural and various ministries; “For this reason, we appreciate the willingness of the Spanish government to prepare these technical reports to obtain such funding.”
Regarding the ongoing works in the old town of Letur, the delegate of the Council in the province of Albacete, Pedro Antonio Ruiz Santoswho visited the city on Wednesday, indicated that a large part of the planned demolitions have already been carried out. “At present, 7 buildings have been demolished, which represents approximately 13 housing units,” said Ruiz Santos, who added that “the sorting carried out during the real estate inspection must be improved, especially in those marked in red , to find out.” the extent of the damage caused and whether its repair is possible, which in some cases can be very important.
