Hopes of finding survivors ebbed four days after torrents of muddy water wrecked towns and infrastructure in the European country's worst such disaster in decades.
Almost all the deaths have been in the Valencia region, where thousands of security and emergency services frantically cleared debris and mud in the search for bodies.
Sanchez said in a televised address that the disaster was the second deadliest flood in Europe this century and announced a huge increase in the security forces dedicated to relief works.
The government had accepted the Valencia region leader's request for 5,000 more troops and informed him of a further deployment of 5,000 police and civil guards, Sanchez said.
Spain was carrying out its largest deployment of army and security force personnel in peacetime, he added.
- Flood aid distribution -
Restoring order and distributing aid to destroyed towns and villages -- some of which have been cut off from food, water and power since Tuesday's torrent -- is a priority.
Authorities have come under fire over the warning systems before the floods, and some stricken residents have complained the response to the disaster is too slow.
"I am aware the response is not enough, there are problems and severe shortages... towns buried by mud, desperate people searching for their relatives... we have to improve," Sanchez said.
In the ground-zero towns of Alfafar and Sedavi, AFP reporters saw no soldiers while residents shovelled mud from their homes and firefighters pumped water from garages and tunnels.
"Thank you to the people who have come to help us, to all of them, because from the authorities, nothing," a furious Estrella Caceres, 66, told AFP in Sedavi.
Authorities in the Valencia region have restricted access to roads for two days to allow emergency services to carry out search, rescue and logistics operations more effectively.
A video circulating in Spanish media on Saturday showed the head of a civil protection team celebrating the rescue of a person who had been trapped in a car for three days.
With telephone and transport networks severely damaged, establishing a precise figure of missing people is difficult.
Sanchez said electricity had been restored to 94 percent of homes affected by power outages and that around half of the cut telephone lines had been repaired.
Some motorways have reopened but local and regional roads resembled a "Swiss cheese", meaning certain places would probably remain inaccessible by land for weeks, Transport Minister Oscar Puente told El Pais daily.
- King to visit -
Ordinary citizens carrying food, water and cleaning equipment continued their grassroots initiative to assist the recovery on Saturday.
Around 1,000 set off from the Mediterranean coastal city of Valencia towards nearby towns laid waste by the floods, an AFP journalist saw.
Authorities have urged people to stay at home to avoid congestion on the roads that would hamper the work of emergency services.
Spanish media reported King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia are due to visit the Valencia area on Sunday with Sanchez and regional leader Carlos Mazon.
Mazon called the floods "the worst moment in our history" on Saturday and laid out a series of proposals to help his region recover, ranging from infrastructure to economic support.
The storm that sparked the floods on Tuesday formed as cold air moved over the warm waters of the Mediterranean and is common for this time of year.
But scientists warn climate change driven by human activity is increasing the ferocity, length and frequency of such extreme weather events.
Emergency services late Saturday issued an updated of toll of 213 people confirmed killed -- 210 in the Valencia region, two in neighbouring Castilla-La Mancha and one in Andalusia in the south.
Authorities have warned the toll could yet rise however as vehicles trapped in tunnels and underground car parks are cleared.
Anger at government grows in ground zero of Spain floods
Alfafar, Spain (AFP) Nov 2, 2024 -
Four days after terrifying floods razed towns in eastern Spain, frustration at the state's response is growing among some despairing residents.
"They've abandoned us," said Charo de la Rosa as she joined dozens of people queueing outside the only surviving pharmacy in Alfafar, a devastated suburb of Spain's third city Valencia.
"I know of dead and missing people... they are neighbours, people you love, you grew up with them... and their cruel death could have been avoided," the hospitality employee told AFP.
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez vowed on Wednesday that his government would not "abandon" the victims as the enormity of the catastrophe became clear. At least 211 people have been killed and dozens are still missing, according to the latest toll.
And on Saturday Sanchez conceded the response has been insufficient and had to "improve" as he announced the deployment of 10,000 extra soldiers and police officers.
A return to normality seemed a pipe dream in Alfafar and the neighbouring town of Sedavi, where the disaster has left deep scars.
Pyramids of mud-covered cars block entire streets and pavements have becoming dumping grounds for mountains of unusable furniture.
As residents resumed the thankless task of clearing the mud, a woman burst into the middle of the street, wailing: she had learned that the floods destroyed her business.
- 'We're dying' -
"Thank you to the people who have come to help us, to all of them, because from the authorities, nothing," said a furious Estrella Caceres, 66.
Friends and relatives tried desperately to save what they could from the destroyed ground floor of the house where she has lived for 40 years.
At the back of the home, her husband Manuel cleaned where the water rose to 1.5 metres (5 feet). A former firefighter, he was now a victim of disasters he helped fight for 33 years.
"This will take months because we can't get the car out, and until the military unit comes to remove everything, we can't take out anything," he said.
Around 35 kilometres (22 miles) to the west of Valencia in the ruined town of Chiva, Oscar Hernandez had a scathing assessment of the official response.
"I'm angry... I don't understand why there isn't a way to shoot the administration in the head," he told AFP.
Hernandez's house lay in tatters and he only received a telephone alert two days after the floods struck.
"We're dying here," the 75-year-old added, reserving his sharpest criticism for Valencia region chief Carlos Mazon who "hasn't moved".
Hernandez hopes an investigation will establish responsibility for what he believes was the state's inadequate preparation.
- 'Every day we cry' -
Maria Jose, 54, sat listlessly on a plastic chair as young volunteers cleared her house which the water and mud have left unrecognisable.
On Tuesday, she received no warning and sent her daughter to school as usual. It was only in the late evening that the authorities alerted her to the overflowing river.
"Every day we cry even more because we realise the scale of the destruction," she said.
The national and regional governments have pledged a major reconstruction effort.
But a sceptical Mario Silvestre has seen plenty of promises in his 84 years and will only believe it when he sees it.
"They talk about 300 million euros ($326 million)... promises which, ultimately, are forgotten. I don't want to speak badly about Spain, but it's a fact," he told AFP.
Back in Sedavi, a fire engine drained water from a two-storey garage holding an unknown number of bodies -- a scene being repeated across the Valencia region.
Hope was ebbing. Firefighter Javier Lopez, his hands spattered with mud, told AFP all the basements were flooded and "quite a few" bodies would be found once the water was pumped out.
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