Lusa – The National Civil Protection Authority (ANPC) registered between 20:00 on Wednesday and 19:30 Friday about a thousand occurrences, most of them since midnight due to the wind.
“From the alert status [20:00 Wednesday 2nd January to 19:30 on 3rd February , we had recorded about a thousand occurrences, however, only today [between 00:00 and 19:30] were recorded 711 occurrences, “Marcos Martins, the ANPC national deputy, told Lusa.
According to Marcos Martins, about 70% of the occurrences occurred on 3rd January. The Civil Protection numbers indicate that of the 540 occurrences associated with the high wind, 513 were due to the fall of trees and the rest to falls from structures.
“As expected, the wind on Friday was a critical factor and there was in fact a very large increase in the number of occurrences due to the wind,” he said.
The districts of Braga, with 180 occurrences, and of Porto and Viana do Castelo, with 153 occurrences each, were the most affected by the wind, which the Portuguese Institute of the Sea and Atmosphere (IPMA) predicts will remain strong with gusts above 100 Kilometers / hour until 03:00 on Saturday.
The IPMA placed under the ‘Orange Warning’ due to the wind and rain until the 03:00 of Saturday the districts of Porto, Braga, Vila Real, Bragança, Guarda, Viseu, Aveiro and Viana do Castelo.
The National Civil Protection Authority activated until Saturday the special alert level of blue level.
The special blue-alert status refers to the need for civil protection agents to strengthen the means of first intervention, targeting only those agents rather than the general population, in order to improve the efficiency of the system. This is the lowest of the four levels.
Despite the numerous civil protection warnings for people to move away from the coastline on bad weather days, there are those who risk their lives, ignoring these warnings.
The zone of the mouth in the Porto was one of the most critical points, with waves of 14 meters.