El Pozo de San Lázaro

Zaragoza. The River Ebro is still really high, although you can see that it's gone down at least a metre from the very high flood waters a couple of weeks ago. Today we went on a walk down Camino de la Torres to the Unión bridge, crossed the swollen river and then walked along the banks to the Stone bridge. Just before the bridge we saw the terrifying pozo (well) of San Lázaro. It's a place where the flood water whirls.

Rafael told me his memory of the terrible accident which happened in 1971. A bus, travelling from Barcelona to Badajóz fell off the bridge and was swallowed by the river. 45 people were rescued and 9 were lost, including 5 children. Apparently thousands of people went to help.

I read that the well or chasm is man-made, probably from first-century excavations to provide stone for the bridge. It was eventually brought from further away because what was extracted wasn't good enough. The chasm is up to 18 metres deep. 

Zaragoza floods

After the heavy snow in the mountains the rivers are running full to overflowing. Both upriver and downriver from Zaragoza there are disastrous floods. Whole villages have been evacuated or made into islands as the Ebro runs through them.
In the city it has burst its banks even more than a month ago. Today I saw a container for paper being swept along by the massive floodwaters.