Madeira floods and mudslides kill 32

[Andaman Andy]

Madeira floods and mudslides kill 32, looks pretty bad out there thats a lot of fatalities for a small island.

[Capt Josh]

Just a terrible tragedy. My prayers go out to the people of Madeira...

[vbmlows]

Patudo, if you are still in Madeira let us know if you are OK buddy.

[Patudo]

I checked up last night and fortunately everyone in the fleet and their families and boats are safe, but thus far there have been around 40 deaths and I'm afraid that number is likely going to increase. The mudslides have collapsed some of the bridges and parts of the island are cut off.

If you visit the island you'll see how built up it is despite how steep it can be in some places and it doesn't take much to imagine what destruction can happen when large volumes of meltwater and rainwater come down from the mountain enough to reshape the earth. In summer only a trickle of water comes down the huge storm drains in the middle of Funchal town but you may have seen those same drains overflowing with torrents of rain and mud. One of those drains got blocked and the river had to go through the drydock and marina area. Similar floods happened around 12 years ago but there was less loss of life, most probably because the island was less built up then.

Madeirans are tough very resilient people, and with assistance coming from the mainland the island will recover but things are difficult at the moment. It's going to be an industrial scale cleanup operation.