A Year on From Spain’s DANA

Juana

Juana Palomo leaned against the doorframe watching on as volunteers cleaned mud from her floor inside her house. It was 5 November 2024, just days after the deluge that swept through towns and villages around Valencia, including Juana’s hometown, Catarroja. It was only when she noticed the camera, that she snapped out of her trance, grabbed a squeegee, and began to clean, all the while keeping her gaze fixed on the lens.

“You have to report on this,” she said.

The water that had entered her house at the height of the flooding had reached eye-level. Juana pointed to where the water washed away a gas canister. Her clothes lay ruined in a sodden pile. The fact that she had an upstairs floor could very well have saved her life.

Five months later, in April 2025, Juana had made progress in her recovery. It was like meeting a completely different Juana. Not only had she cut and coloured her hair, but she seemed more present in the conversation – less distracted, less fearful. Juana was now living with her daughter and three granddaughters (they lost their house in the floods) on the upper floor of her home. The ground floor was superficially clean, Juana was still waiting for financial aid to renovate properly.

“I’ve been given some help, but it’s expensive to recover. Also, they don’t ask for budgets when they give you financial help, how am I supposed to know whether what I receive will cover the renovation?” Financial help and resources are among the final hurdles this 70-year-old needs in order to continue in her recovery from the floods.

Lola

Elsewhere in Catarroja, Lola Ramón and her partner Miguel, were trying to rebuild their lives on 21 November 2024. Without electricity for three weeks, Lola illuminated the damage in their home with a headtorch. Inside the house itself, the only light came from a lamp strung from a broken ceiling fan, plugged into a power outlet on the floor above.

Charismatic and energetic, Lola reacted to the shock of the floods by working hard. By  April 2025, she had managed to clean up, paint, and craft her patio to a point where it was as good as before, if not better.

But without distractions, she seemed to get lost in her thoughts. While posing for a photo, the conversation drifted off, she began to think out loud. “Now we have to do everything all over again, buy everything again.” She’s still reeling, but her determination to dig herself out of the hole and leave the house spotless is much stronger. That mental image of her house “as it was before,” with things in their place and the space clean and tidy, promises a kinder future, a scenario that overcomes the fear and chaos of such a terrible experience. “We’ll make it,” she said. “Because there’s no other way, but also because we want to. There’s still so much to do, and we’re going to do it.”