With the number of deaths by drowning steadily increasing, figures released on Tuesday by la Real Federación Española de Salvamento y Socorrismo show that the Province of Alicante has suffered 21 drownings so far in 2017.
This makes it the province within the Valencian Community where the most people have died from drowning. The figure reflects the total recorded as at 15 July to which two more deaths should be added, having both occurred on Monday in Torrevieja and Xàbia, which brings the number recorded in the Valencian Community to 33.
The figures show the Community to be the fourth Spanish autonomy of recorded drownings exceeding the 31 deaths recorded during the same period in 2016 and the 16 drownings in 2015. This figure represents 12.6% of the total of 246 deaths in the whole of Spain during this period.
By province, apart from the 21 deaths recorded in Alicante, there have been 12 drownings in València, an increase of 2, while in Castellón there has been a total of just two drownings since the beginning of the year.
The majority of the victims in the Community were men (81%), Spanish nationals (67%), aged between 65 and 74 years (32.3%), who died on a beach (61%) between 10 am and 2 pm (38.8%).
According to the reports, lifeguards, or some sort of rescue service, was deployed in only 23% of the cases which resulted in the deaths.
Placed above the Valencian autonomy was Andalusia, with 45 deaths, and the Canaries and Galicia, with 38 deaths each. In Catalonia there were 22 deaths, 14 in Cantabria, 13 in the Balearics and 10 in Murcia. In Spain as a whole, 246 drownings have been recorded this year, eight more than in 2016 and 79 more than in 2015, confirming the upward trend in drowning deaths in the marine environment.
