At least 32 people are feared dead after mudslides and floods swept the Portuguese holiday island of Madeira.

[Pastor Dale Morgan]

Perilous Times and Climate Change

At least 32 people are feared dead after mudslides and floods swept the Portuguese holiday island of Madeira.
 

By Colin Freeman and Nick Meo
Published: 6:21PM GMT 20 Feb 2010

Mudslides caused by torrential rains on the Portuguese island of Madeira

More than 60 others were also hospitalised as torrential streams of water and liquid mud swept through the capital, Funchal, destroying homes, overturning cars and felling trees. The Atlantic island, which lies around 600 miles south-west of Portugal, is a popular destination for British holidaymakers and is thought to have been busy this week with half-term visitors. Last night the Foreign Office said it was monitoring the situation, althought there were no reports of foreign tourists being killed or injured.

The Portuguese interior minister Rui Pereira was preparing to make an emergency visit to the island, which was battered by winds in excess of 70mph.

"We’re overwhelmed by calls from people asking for help after the torrential rains," added one duty officer at the civil protection service.

Rescue efforts have been hampered by strong winds, high seas and blocked roads, while phone and electricity lines thought to have sustained severe damage.

Portugal's prime minister, Jose Socrates, expressed his “profound shock” at the scale of the devastation, which is thought to have affected mainly the capital.

Ricardo Macedo, 50, manager of the Hotel Monte Carlo in Funchal, said the flooding was the worst anyone could ever recall in the holiday island.

He said: “This was worse than the last really big storm in 1993. We have been told that three inches of rain fell in an hour.

“I saw a new BMW floating past the end of my street today.

“And yet yesterday people were coming back to the hotel with nice pink faces after a sunny day out, and this evening two of my British guests, a couple of teachers who are here for a half-term break, wandered into the centre of Funchal to look for somewhere to eat.

“There are thousands of British holidaymakers here at the moment, we are a favourite with the British. The radio reports have not said that any foreigners have died or been injured, but some must have been caught up in it.

“Some of the tourist hotels have been caught up in the flooding. One was half underwater with tourists hanging out the windows.

“The amount of water was quite amazing. One ravine where usually you look down and there is a trickle of water thirty feet below you was flooding over. Two people were swept off a footbridge.

“Funchal is in a natural amphitheatre and the water flooded down into it.

“The police force have been brilliant though, and so have municipality workers. They have saved a lot of people, I think.”

A duty official at the civil protection service in Madeira's capital Funchal told Reuters news agency: "We have confirmed 32 dead, but we're still trying to figure out how many people are missing, so the final death toll can be higher still."

Alberto Joao Jardim, the leader of the regional government on the island, said another 68 people were in hospital emergency wards. He said the government was making temporary shelters available for hundreds of people who had been left homeless.

The island, which lies 300 miles from the Moroccan coast, markets itself as a year-round resort, and is known for its Madeira wine, flowers, and spectacular fireworks show, believed to be the largest in the world. The large harbour at Funchal is also a major stopover for cruisers en route from Europe to the Caribbean.

In Funchal, an elderly woman died when the roof of her house caved in while two others were crushed by a crane, according to local media reports.

“It had been raining since dawn and our hotel was evacuated as it is near a river in the city centre,” said Aymeric Payan, a French hotel employee in Funchal.

The storms are beleived to be the deadliest in Madeira since October 1993, when eight people died.