Queen Letizia and King Felipe VI were hit by mud thrown by protestors as they visited an area of Spain devastated by the recent flash flooding.
On Sunday, Nov. 3, the King and Queen of Spain paid a visit to the eastern city of Valencia as the death toll from the flooding reached over 200 people.
According to the BBC, the royal couple were subjected to shouts of “murderer” and “shame” as they walked through the town of Paiporta — one of the worst affected in the region — while mud and other objects were also thrown at them.
In footage shared by the outlet, King Felipe, 56, was shown being guided through the streets as hundreds of people shouted heckles and threw objects in his direction. Another video showed Queen Letizia, 52, with mud on her face and in tears as she spoke to residents and hugged one who was overcome with emotion.
The scenes came amid a growing sense of anger in Spain over a perceived lack of warning about the floods and the level of government support that has been provided to those affected.
Under Spain’s constitution, Felipe is the head of state but — like the British royals and King Charles — he has no political power. The day-to-day running of the country is controlled by the elected Spanish government under Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, who was reportedly struck by a protestor during the same visit and evacuated by his security team, the Spanish Minister of the Interior Fernando Grande-Marlaska told reporters on Monday, Nov. 4.
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Per The Guardian, an alert urging residents not to leave home on Oct. 29 was sent after the flood waters began surging.
According to the outlet, during Felipe’s visit, he was confronted by a man who told him, “You’ve abandoned us. You’re four days too late.”
The man also asked Felipe about the alert being sent hours after the state-run weather agency had warned of the worsening conditions.
“They knew it, they knew it, and yet they did nothing,” he shouted at Felipe, per the outlet. “It’s a disgrace.”
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The monarch appeared to address his visit in a video posted online hours later.
“One has to understand the anger and frustration of many people given all that they have gone through, as well as the difficulty in understanding how all the mechanisms work when it comes to the emergency operations,” he told officials in Valencia, The Guardian reported.
In a post shared on X (formerly known as Twitter) on Oct. 30, Felipe said he was “devastated” by the flooding.
“Strength, courage and all the necessary support for all those affected,” he wrote.
Two hundred and seventeen bodies have been recovered so far from the wreckage left by the flooding, according to the Associated Press. Of those who died, 213 were in the eastern Valencia region.
As previously reported by PEOPLE, a year’s worth of rainfall fell in about eight hours in Valencia on Oct. 29, according to Reuters and the BBC.
The rainfall prompted the most devastating flood in Spain in 30 years and left more than 140,000 people without power in Valencia. It is the deadliest flood since the 1996 flood in the Pyrenees mountains that killed 87 people, per Reuters.
