ARCHIVED - Murcian and Spanish news round-up week ending 20th January 2017

Snow, snow and more snow as the Costa Cálida receives its heaviest falls for decades

This week we make no apology for concentrating on the severe winter weather which has affected the Region of Murcia since Wednesday, an episode which is still not over and which at lunchtime on Friday was still hitting the north and north-west of the Region, with numerous roads in the north and north-west of the Region closed to traffic.

It had been forecast that snow could reach Murcia, but few expected what for many were the heaviest falls in their lifetimes. On Wednesday morning snow clouds approached the Costa Cálida from the east, bringing a covering of white to the southern Costa Blanca and coastal areas of Murcia including La Manga, San Pedro Pinatar and San Javier, as well as towns in the Campo de Cartagena such as Pozo Estrecho and Balsicas.

By soon after 10.00 the snow had reached the outskirts of the regional capital, especially on higher ground, and not long afterwards the first flakes were reported in the city centre and at the university campus in Espinardo. By nightfall various secondary roads on higher ground were impassable even near the coast, and there were long tailbacks even on the A-30 Murcia-Cartagena motorway in the Puerto de la Cadena, the mountain pass just south of the regional capital.

Partly this was due to the normal heavy traffic at the end of the day, but the problems were exacerbated by excited schoolchildren convincing their parents to take them up towards Corvera and Baños y Mendigo to throw snowballs and build snowmen. Their excitement is easy to understand, as the last time snow settled in the city of Murcia was in 1983, and the job of persuading Mum and Dad to get in the car was probably made easier in many cases by the fact that neither the young ones nor their parents had ever seen snow here before!

As the day wore on the temperatures fell, and the daily maximum of 4.2ºC was the lowest ever recorded at the Guadalupe Aemet observatory just outside Murcia. The city of Lorca enjoyed picture postcard scenes as children frolicked in the snow, and in Cartagena snow settled for the first time in 80 years!

The delight of children was further increased when the regional government took the almost unprecedented step of cancelling classes on Thursday and Friday at schools in eight municipalities due to snow, following an incident near La Paca, in the countryside of Lorca, in which 30 children had to be rescued after their school bus was trapped in the snowstorm. They were on their way home from Lorca to Zarzadilla de Totana when the bus got stuck in a drift after sliding across the road in Las Terreras de La Paca, and the emergency services had to contact their parents, who ferried the students home while tractors were brought in to tow the bus to safety.

Further south, the journey by car between Puerto de Mazarrón and Cartagena, which is normally a pleasant half-hour drive, became a nightmare due to road closures. Heavy snow in the mountains, with depths of up to 15 centimetres, forced the closure of both the RM-332, which takes drivers inland through Tallante and Molinos Marfagones, and the RM-E22 which runs from Isla Plana and La Azohía to Canteras, as snow and ice brought hazardous conditions in the Puerto de Valdelentisco and the Cuestas del Cedacero. In other parts of Spain mountain passes were open only to vehicles equipped with snow chains, but the truth of the matter in this part of the Costa Cálida is that extremely few drivers have invested in such optional extras!

Ironically, only the day before it had been announced that repair work on the E-22 had been completed at a cost of 25,000 euros following the damage done to retaining walls which prevent rock falls during December’s torrential rain

These were by no means the only roads affected, and also in the south-west of Murcia the RM-11 motorway which links Lorca and Águilas was closed due to snow in the mountains.

For many people living along the south coast of the Region of Murcia the biggest event of Thursday came at around lunchtime when, just as it seemed it might never happen, it finally stopped raining after 24 hours of incessant downpour. However, Murcia was not out of the woods yet, and the snow moved inland, causing chaos on the roads of the north and north-west as the depth reached up to 35 centimetres in Bullas by mid-afternoon.

At the same time, the driving rain which had fallen throughout the morning in central and southern Murcia brought flooding in the area around the regional capital as floodwater channels or “ramblas” burst their banks. In the Murcia outlying districts of Espinardo and Churra numerous roads were closed to traffic as the tarmac disappeared under streams of muddy water, and traffic slowed on the RM-19 dual carriageway between the capital and San Javier as an irrigation ditch overflowed and encroached onto the road.

Unfortunately, as of Friday lunchtime the cold snap is not over yet, and more rain and snow are forecast on Friday and Saturday as well as waves of up to 5 metres on the Mediterranean coast. The main problems remain in the north, north-west and around Lorca, but the south of the region is now pretty much clear of any snow. On Friday the north-west is still on orange alert status for snow, and strong winds are expected elsewhere in the Region, but by Sunday, if the forecasters are right (and they have been so far this week) the worst should be over. On Saturday in Murcia and Cartagena daytime highs could reach the dizzy heights of 9 and 10 degrees respectively! Already the sun is shining outside the office window and there's hardly any evidence of the 20cm of snow which lay outside the door on Thursday morning, apart from a collapsed greenhouse, flattened plants, muddy dogs and bent trees!

Of course the effect on agriculture cannot yet be quantified, but it has already been reported that valuable vines which form part of the grape growing area around Totana has been decimated, and this could exacerbate the shortage of fruit and veg on the shelves of British supermarkets over the next few weeks, adding to the problems already experienced due to the rains which fell just before Christmas!

Other municipalities are also reporting agricultural damage, and in Cehegín the roof fell in on the municipal sports pavilion.

Tourism news

The annual Fitur tourism fair, one of the most important events of its kind in the world, opened in Madrid on Wednesday, when King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia were welcomed to the Murcia stand by regional president Pedro Antonio Sánchez.

Following a good year for tourism in the Region of Murcia in 2016 the main emphasis of the authorities this year is on the program to protect and improve the Mar Menor area following the algal problems of last year, and the Holy Jubilee Year in Caravaca de la Cruz. As well as commenting on these issues to the King, Sr Sánchez presented the royal couple with a replica of the Holy Cross of Caravaca and formally invited them to visit the city during the year.

This follows a successful year for tourism in Murcia in 2016, when the number of people staying in the Region’s hotels and other official tourist accommodation (including those from elsewhere in Spain) rose by 10.7% to over 1.5 million.

At the same time cruise ship visitor numbers in Cartagena rose by 23% to 186,000, and all of this growth resulted in the creation of more jobs in the sector.

Prior to the start of Fitur, Ana Belén Castejón, the Deputy Mayoress of Cartagena, spent last weekend in the Norwegian capital of Oslo on a mission to secure deals with tour operators to bring more Scandinavian tourists to the city this year.

Sunken 140-ton yacht retrieved from Aguilas fishing port

The task of retrieving sunken 39-metre yacht “Penélope” from the bed of the fishing port of Águilas proved to be a complicated one, but last weekend efforts were made to stabilize the 150-ton cranes which had been installed and ensure that the hull of the yacht did not break when it was brought to the surface. This was finally achieved on Wednesday.

Spain devotes 4.6 million euros to restoring Mar Menor beaches after December floods

The national government of Spain announced on Tuesday that it is to set aside 4.6 million euros to help in repairing the damage done by the heavy rainfall and flooding in December to the beaches of the Costa Cálida, responding to what is described as the need for a “rapid response” in order to ensure that they are in good condition by Easter.

This amount is contained in the “Plan Litoral 2017” coastline project which has been unveiled by the Ministry of Agriculture, Fishing, Food and the Environment, and it is also specified that work to restore the beaches will begin by the end of January. Restoration is deemed necessary in the municipalities of Los Alcázares, San Javier, San Pedro del Pinatar, Cartagena, Águilas, Lorca and Mazarrón (in other words all of the coastal municipalities of Murcia except La Unión).

Spanish news round-up week ending 20^th January 2017

Mainland Spain in the grip of Arctic cold and heavy snow

It is an often repeated fact that one of the main attractions of visiting and living in Spain is the weather, but over the course of the last week, other than in the Canary Islands, that maxim has probably been applicable only to survival experts and winter sports fans!

For the last seven days waves of Arctic cold and heavy snow have swept across the whole of the country, leaving in their wake both picturesque landscapes and chaos on the roads. Over the weekend residents in the Pyrenees endured more than half a metre of snow, temperatures of -6ºC and strong winds, with the heaviest falls occurring in the Aragón province of Huesca and the region of Navarra, and this was followed on Monday by wind speeds of up to 120 km/h and drifts of two metres. Ski resorts near the French border were closed due to the adverse conditions, snow chains were a must throughout Huesca, and much of Castilla y Leon shivered in temperatures of minus 10.

By Wednesday, though, the worst of the weather had shifted, unusually to the east and south-east of Spain. Some of the severest conditions since then have been in Murcia (see above), but as Wednesday dawned there were also significant snowfalls on the island of Mallorca.

As the day went on snow settled on the beaches of Alicante, in some cases (such as that of Torrevieja) for the first time in a century, and beach resorts such as Denia and Orihuela Costa were also covered in white for what was the first time in living memory for most residents.

By Thursday the heaviest snow had moved slightly further north and inland, leaving hundreds of drivers and rail passengers stranded overnight and closing schools throughout Alicante and part of Valencia. The ports of the Comunidad Valenciana were closed by waves of up to six metres, and friends and relatives visiting inmates on Thursday at the prison of Villena, in the Alto Vinalopó area of Alicante, found themselves unexpectedly spending the night trapped in jail as heavy snow cut the penitentiary off from the outside world.

However, on the other side of the coin were the inmates who were unable to return to their cells after temporary permits, and enjoyed an extra day of freedom until conditions improved!

Elsewhere in southern Spain what started as a light flurry of snow in Ronda, in the north-west of the province of Málaga, turned into a full-blown storm which left the historic city cut off from the rest of Andalucía by a 25-centimetre coating of snow.

All roads to Ronda were blocked and the Town Hall swiftly cancelled classes at the 4 secondary and 11 primary schools in the municipality on Thursday as the snow continued to fall, and by morning the town was effectively isolated from the outside world.

Unfortunately, this episode of polar winds and sub-zero temperatures has been accompanied by rises in the cost to consumers of both electricity and butane gas bottles!

Of course it is not the case that nothing else happened in Spain this week, but the main talking point in homes, cafés, workplaces and the media has been the weather, and according to the forecasters this is likely to be the case until Sunday when there is finally expected to be some respite for the east of the country.

Basque separatism: thousands demand relocation of ETA convicts to Basque Country prisons

Thousands of demonstrators joined the annual march held by the platform group Sare in the streets of Bilbao on Saturday evening, demanding that the members and former members of Basque separatist terrorist group ETA who are currently serving prison sentences should be re-located to jails within the Basque Country rather than distributed over the whole country.

This issue is widely held to be one of the few remaining sticking points which prevent the definitive disbanding of ETA, who laid down their arms in October 2016 having declared a ceasefire the year before. The group is now believed to dwindled to a small number of activists who are refusing to completely dismantle their organization until their colleagues are at least re-located to their native region, enabling families to visit with greater ease.

However, the central government in Madrid continues to stand firm, maintaining the policy of separating ETA convicts in order to prevent them from associating with one another.

Illegal immigration: bodies of illegal migrants washed up on Cadiz beaches

Until early this week the calm sea conditions continue to prevail in the Mediterranean, but unfortunately last Friday the dead bodies of five immigrants were washed ashore on the beaches of the province of Cádiz in the Strait of Gibraltar. A sixth casualty was a woman who died on board a small boat which was intercepted 35 miles of the coast of the north African enclave of Ceuta, accompanied by seven others who were still alive but were suffering from various degrees of hypothermia.

Iñaki Urdangarín turns 49 awaiting Noos Case verdict: Sunday 15th January was the 49th birthday of Iñaki Urdangarín, the former Duke of Palma, husband of Princess Cristina of Spain and brother-in-law of Felipe VI, but in all probability the celebrations at the family home in Switzerland were somewhat mooted as he wonders whether he will be blowing out the candles on his 50^th birthday cake behind bars.

Valencia oceanarium presents baby beluga whale: Kylu was born in November after a 502-day pregnancy and weighed in at an impressive 74 kilos!

Two dead in plane crash in Toledo: the plane came down 100 metres from the runway in Casarrubios del Monte.

Musical homage paid to the Denia red prawn: the importance of the red prawn in Denia is such that on 28^th February the town will hold its sixth annual Red Prawn Creative Cooking competition at the Mercado Municipal. This competition is open to all professional chefs, but unfortunately membership of the tasting and judging panel is restricted to gastronomic critics and chefs, rather than being open to online English language journalists!

Spain maintains Gibraltar joint sovereignty offer: Alfonso Dastis describes the Spanish proposal as “extremely generous”.

San Sebastian celebrates annual drumming fiesta: Every year at midnight on 19^th/20^th January the Mayor of San Sebastián hoists the city’s flag in the Konstituzio Plaza in the old city centre, and for the following 24 hours locals dressed as cooks and soldiers march through the city banging their drums.

Trump suffers indignity at Madrid wax museum unveiling: just three days before Donald Trump officially took office as the President of the USA, the Madrid wax museum unveiled its likeness of the controversial Republican on Tuesday at a ceremony which was spectacularly interrupted by an activist belonging to the women’s rights group Femen. Shouting the slogan “grab them by the balls” in English, a young woman stripped to the waist rushed onto the podium where the wax figure was presented and immediately matched her words with appropriate actions.

Spanish property news

A report published by leading property valuation firm Tinsa on Tuesday concludes that at the end of 2016 there were approximately 340,000 unoccupied new properties in Spain, representing 21.3% of all those completed since 2008. During the course of the year the figure fell from 24.9% at the end of 2015.

The highest rates of unsold new properties, again according to Tinsa, are those in the provinces of (37.6%), Cuenca (36.2%) and Castellón (30.3%), while the Basque Country, where there was less speculative construction during the boom years, has the lowest indices: in Bilbao, only 10% of new properties are unsold, a proportion which is matched on the coast of Granada in Andalucía.

Tinsa also report that there are currently 63,000 new residential properties being built in Spain, reflecting the fact that as stock dwindles so interest in building has reawakened in many areas. Approximately a quarter of this construction is in the region of Madrid (15,900 homes), with significant proportions also accounted for by the provinces of Alicante (5,500) and Barcelona (4,500).