Issue #13

The Sun is Shining Today!

For time immemorial, neighbours have chatted about the weather but here in Spain the weather has been so dramatic as to be the stuff of headlines. This month the top weather story was Barcelona´s blizzard. One of the English-language publications here on the Costa del Sol stated, “If you think Andalucian weather has been bad then just take a look at Barcelona, which has been hit with the heaviest snowfall in 25 years. The Catalan capital came to a standstill, while flights were cancelled, schools were closed and trains were trapped on the tracks after 50 centimetres of snow.”

In 2004 the European Environment Agency predicted that Spain and Portugal would be most affected by coming climate change. “Storms, floods and droughts are likely to become more and more frequent with a significant rise in temperature expected…Natural disasters appear to becoming more frequent with twice as many serious events recorded in Europe in the nineties in comparison with the previous decade. Such events can cause very heavy economic losses, e.g. the droughts of 1999 caused losses of more than 3 billion euros in Spain.”

Ironically, the weather news in Andalucia this month has been about all the rain. Roads in Nerja, ruined by floods in 2007 and that deteriorated further with recent rains will be repaired, cliffs are to be reinforced and a bridge will be replaced. The price tag is an estimated 257,000 euros. Agricultural losses and estimated damage to infrastructure due to recent heavy rainfall in La Axarquia region is 172 million euros. Olives alone account for four million of that figure. In the Forest Hills area of Estepona, recent rains caused devastating landslides last week. Eight of the evacuated families have been given the green light to return to their homes but three others are not so fortunate. The Estepona town hall is repairing the affected streets. Cartama town hall has reported damage caused by heavy rains to the municipal cemetery and thirty niches had to be relocated to a new pavillion. Alhaurin de la Torre town hall is suing the owners of the Santa Amalia stables for the cost of removing the carcasses of twenty-six horses, along with numerous dogs,goats, and ponies who died when the stable, built illegally on a floodplain, was inundated by the Rio Guadalhorce. Economic commentators state that the unseasonably poor weather on the Costa del Sol and its resulting lower tourist numbers have had a greater financial impact on local businesses than the international economic downturn. Andrew Forbes writes in the Sur in English.”…it appears the winter weather has been the last straw for some of the coasts most prestigious hotels.” He quotes Count Rudi Von Schonburg as saying, “climate change and the heavy rain has put clients off coming here.”