Households cut off in Genalguacil after rivers burst their banks

About 20 people from Genalguacil are currently stuck in their homes because the Almáchar and Genal rivers have burst their banks due to the heavy rain, says the mayor of this village in the Genal Valley, Miguel Ángel Herrera.

Because the water is so high, they are unable to cross the bridges on the roads to Estepona and Benarrabá. The worst situation is on the Estepona road, because many people from the village use it to get to work and back.

Herrera is angry because he says this is a regular occurrence. The pipes on these bridges, especially the ones over the Almáchar river, he explains, are too narrow and can’t handle the quantity of flood water. “I took food to my father yesterday because I knew what was going to happen,” he says, and he is calling on the Junta de Andalucía for a solution.

“This is nothing new. The Malaga provincial council and the Junta know all about this; they know that one day someone is going to fall into the river and will be killed. We can’t live like this. It is the same every single winter,” he says. “They talk about depopulation and not wanting people to move out of the villages, but it seems we are always having to demand that they do something to resolve problems”.

Elsewhere, rain has also cut off the road between Ardales, Casarabonela and El Burgo because the Arroyo Blanquillo has overflowed on the boundary between El Burgo and Casarabonela, says the mayor of El Burgo, José Joaquín García. Several pine trees have also fallen and had to be removed on the road between El Burgo and Serrato.