A 20-month-old baby died in the early hours of Tuesday (30) after a hailstone fell on his head during a storm in Catalonia, in northeastern Spain. The information was confirmed by the hospital where the girl was taken, in the city of Girona, about an hour from Barcelona.
The incident took place in La Bisbal d’Empordà, a town located in the region, which witnessed an unusual storm on Tuesday (30) afternoon.
According to residents, the hailstorm lasted only ten minutes, but the ice boulders were huge, up to 11 centimeters in diameter. In addition to the baby, they injured about 50 other people, according to channel TV3. The wounds ranged from bruises to broken bones.
Cars, roofs and the church’s stained glass window were also damaged, according to images released by the city and television stations.
According to the meteorological service Meteocat, the hailstones were the biggest seen in Catalonia in two decades. Parts of the region warned of storms on Wednesday (31).
The Northern Hemisphere summer has accumulated extreme weather events in many parts of the European continent.
In England, for example, thermometers rose above 40°C for the first time in history last month, and the government declared a state of drought in half the country, and several countries have been the scene of forest fires. Scientists attribute these phenomena to the climate emergency.
