Overview

• The Subdirección General de Emergencias in Valencia forwarded the full 99-message flood alert library to Judge Nuria Ruiz Tobarra in July 2025 as part of her inquiry into the 228 deaths during the October 29, 2024 DANA flood.
• Judge Ruiz Tobarra has identified the single 20:11 warning from that evening as tardy and flawed and is probing whether its minimal guidance undermined residents’ ability to seek safety.
• The message bank was commissioned by the Agencia Valenciana de Seguridad y Respuesta a las Emergencias under Plan Vega Renhace, with development by the Universidad de Alicante beginning in April 2021 and completion delayed by the pandemic until February 2023.
• Officials emphasize that the library was tailored solely for the GVA112 Avisos mobile app; it was not designed for use with the nascent ES Alert system, which had no defined protocol at the time.
• Having been piloted only in the Vega Baja region, the guide’s limited regional testing has drawn scrutiny over its applicability during the widespread flooding of October 2024.