Police, Civil Protection personnel and firemen today found the body of a woman who had been missing since Sunday night after her car left the road and plunged into a steep ravine near São Teotónio, Alentejo.
The accident appears to have been reported by the driver of the vehicle who suffered only slight injuries. The victim was his mother. The car left the clifftop between Barca and Cabo Sardão and plunged onto the rocks below.
The partially submerged car was found on Sunday night and a search for the driver was resumed on Monday morning at 07:00.
Ten minutes later, the Air Force helicopter crew spotted the body of the woman, according to the Beja District Civil Relief Command.
The body of Maria Isabel Alves, 71, was about about 300 metres from where the car has plunged onto the rocks.
Three people have died at Portugal beaches this holiday weekend, before the swimming season officially has started.
At the Praia da Rainha, Costa da Caparica, Sétubal, three people were taken out of the water around 1:40 pm on Monday, at Praia da Rainha. A 26-year-old man and a woman survived but had had signs of hypothermia. The victim had tried to save the couple but he ran into difficulty and later died at Garcia de Orta Hospital in Almada.
The three were in the same group. They were on the beach and had decided to take a swim and were helped out of the water by surfers in the area who could not save one of the swimmers.
At Praia da Nazaré, a Spanish couple drowned after being dragged into the sea by a wave. The victims were tourists, aged 77 and 75, who were walking on the beach before being swept away.
When rescue services arrived the couple already were dead. The 75-year-old woman was located quickly and her body recovered but the man was missing for two hours before rescue services found his lifeless body.
In Póvoa de Varzim, Oporto, an Austrian couple also was dragged into the sea by a wave. The man managed to get back to shore but the woman later was rescued from the water in a poor state and died in hospital.
In the Algarve, the beaches in Albufeira will be monitored from 15 May. The swimming season opens officially on June 1st.
