GENEVA 

Torrential rains battered the Balearic Islands on Tuesday, flooding roads, cutting public transport, and forcing authorities to keep schoolchildren in classrooms for their safety.

According to Spain’s weather agency AEMET, the islands of Ibiza and Formentera faced extreme rainfall, with up to 200 liters per square meter in two hours and forecasts of 180 liters per square meter in 12 hours. The storm overwhelmed drainage systems and left several main access roads to Ibiza town underwater.

The emergency agency raised the alert to red earlier in the day until 4 pm local time. The current maximum warning in Spain is now orange.

Emergency services chief Pablo Garriz, according to daily El Mundo, said the storm’s intensity evolved throughout the day, requiring a reevaluation of the situation as problems escalated.

The regional government suspended afternoon classes and urged parents not to collect their children, stressing that students remained safe under teachers’ supervision. Civil Protection sent mobile alerts to all phones in Ibiza at noon, warning of "serious flood risk" and advising people to stay indoors, avoid rivers and low-lying areas, and move to higher floors if water entered their homes.

The island’s main ring roads were closed, while public transport was halted.

The events come a day after rains from storm Gabrielle on Monday caused flooding across Spain’s Valencia, Catalonia and Aragon regions.

With as much as 100 liters of rain per square meter in a few hours, police said they had to rescue several people from their vehicles.

One of the hardest hit areas was the town of Aldaia in Valencia, where the La Saleta ravine burst its banks, sending water flowing into the central streets. However, anti-flood barriers held.

Spain has faced increasingly extreme weather events in recent years, which scientists link to climate change.

Last October, torrential rains in the same region caused one of the deadliest and most costly natural disasters in Spanish history, with around 232 people killed.