A study from the Universitat Politècnica de València details the scale of the DANA flood in l’Horta Sud on October 29, 2024, with water speeds reaching up to 8 meters per second and depths exceeding 4 meters. Led by Francisco Vallés Morán, the research shows how the flood followed the area's historical geomorphology and how infrastructure like the V-31 worsened the disaster.
The DANA flood in the l’Horta Sud region near Valencia left a trail of destruction on October 29, 2024. A new study from the Universitat Politècnica de València (UPV), published in the journal Cuadernos de Geografía of the Universitat de València, quantifies the event's lethality using two-dimensional hydraulic modeling.
Water surged at extreme speeds of up to 8 meters per second in the Poyo–Torrent and Poçalet–Saleta barrancos, with response times under one hour from the headwaters to densely populated urban areas. Depths reached over 4 meters at key points, explaining the immense destructive energy of the overflowed flows.
Led by Francisco Vallés Morán from the UPV's Institute of Water and Environmental Engineering (IIAMA), the analysis drew on public data and open-access tools to reconstruct the flood's dynamics. It highlights how the water faithfully followed historical paleochannels and natural accumulation zones, confirming the model's accuracy.
A worsening factor was the V-31 highway, which created backwater effects, raising levels upstream and hindering drainage. This underscores the need to review infrastructure amid climate change.
The study also introduces an innovative tool based on hydraulic power to map high-risk drag zones. This methodology is already in use by emergency services for searching missing persons, optimizing real-time decisions and potentially saving lives in future floods.
