A 20-month-old girl died overnight from Tuesday to Wednesday in northeastern Spain after being hit by hailstones during a violent storm that injured several people and caused extensive damage. The girl lost her life after having received a ball of ice several centimeters in diameter on the skull, in La Bisbal d’Empordà, a locality located near Girona, in Catalonia, announced the local and health authorities.
The hailstone “fell on her head” and “she did not survive”, Carme Vall, a municipal councilor from La Bisbal d’Empordà, told RAC1 radio. “The hail only fell for ten minutes, but it was ten minutes of terror,” she added. The Girona hospital, where the child had been transferred, specified that she was 20 months old and confirmed that she had died during the night in this establishment, without further details.
A teenager in “critical condition”
According to the Catalan emergency services, the hailstones that hit the region during the night injured several people and caused enormous damage, due to the size of the hailstones, whose diameter reached up to 10 centimeters, stressed the meteorological services. In La Bisbal d’Empordà, the stained glass windows of the church were thus shattered and many cars were damaged, some having had their roofs sunk in or the windows broken, can we see on images broadcast by public television or on social networks.
These bad weather continued on Wednesday with heavy rainfall and strong winds. In Vilanova del Camí, a town 30 kilometers from Barcelona, a 13-year-old boy was hospitalized in “critical condition” after being injured by a falling tree branch late Wednesday afternoon. Catalan emergency services said.