Lisbon: Violent weather brought on by Storm Claudia killed three people and injured dozens in Portugal, authorities said, while British workers are organising evacuations due to heavy flooding in Wales and England.
Portugal and parts of neighbouring Spain have faced days of extreme conditions brought on by Storm Claudia, which had reached parts of Britain and Ireland by Saturday, UK time.
Emergency services workers help people on a flooded street in Monmouth, Wales.Credit: Getty Images
Rescue workers found the bodies of an elderly couple inside their flooded home in Fernao Ferro, across the River Tagus from Lisbon, on Thursday (Friday AEDT). They were apparently sleeping and were unable to flee as the water rose during the night.
On Saturday, a tornado struck Albufeira in southern Portugal, emergency services said.
Footage shot from a distance that was posted online showed the tornado damaging and destroying caravans at a camping area, where regional civil protection commander Vitor Vaz Pinto said an 85-year-old British woman was killed.
Twenty-eight people were injured at a nearby hotel, he said. Two of them were in hospital with serious injuries.
In a statement on Saturday, Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa expressed “his solidarity with the family of the victim who died” in Albufeira and wished a speedy recovery to those injured.
Portuguese weather service IPMA placed the Algarve, Beja and Setubal districts on amber alert, the country’s second-highest alert level.
