Flash floods have isolated le Cinque Terre, closed autostrade in Tuscany, cut off train service along the Riviera
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Flash floods have isolated le Cinque Terre, closed autostrade in Tuscany, cut off train service along the Riviera
Severe flash floods hit le Cinque Terre this afternoon and parts of Tuscany south of Parma. The town of Monterosso al Mare and Vernazza in particular had raging waters rip through their tiny towns, as
Severe flash floods hit le Cinque Terre this afternoon and parts of Tuscany south of Parma. The town of Monterosso al Mare and Vernazza in particular had raging waters rip through their tiny towns, as did small towns such as Pontremoli in the Lunigiana area of Tuscany.
All of le Cinque Terre is now inaccessible by train or car, and train service along the Ligurian coast has been suspended.
If you were thinking of visiting the area in the coming days or weeks, make sure you first check to see that the towns are accessible and the trains are running, and do not go at all if the forecast is for rain.
This morning's news was that they were evacuating parts of Monterosso al Mare and Vernazza. It's an ongoing perilous situation with regard to visiting le Cinque Terre. It only the beginning of the rainy season there, so it raises real worries about unknowing people visiting there, even day tripping, until the situation with the hillsides is stabilized. So I hope people will pass that warning along to anyone who comes here looking for advice about visiting le Cinque Terre in the coming weeks. I am thinking that once international camera crews get in there, American and British (and hopefully Australian) media will broadcast some news about it so more travelers know.
I don't know if anyone here recalls a recent post by a woman whose travel itinerary was roughly to go to Piemonte, then swing down to le Cinque Terre, then over to Florence, and then up to Vicenza and Lago di Como, but she was asking for advice about iffy weather. We suggested she keep her plans loose and dependent on weather, RC suggesting Bologna as an alternate, and me suggesting someplace closer to Genova in case of rain. Last we heard from her, she was looking for accommodations in Camogli, and would have arrived this past Sunday, an absolutely gorgeous day. It turned rainy enough over the following 2 days that it would have discouraged any but the most determined to daytrip to le Cinque Terre -- but I confess i stayed up last night until 3am looking at news reports of 2 foreign tourists missing in Vernazza. Those tourists had a car (which our poster here did not), and they were found alive this morning.
But I've learned my lesson. From here on out, I am going to tell people that in off-season, booking in le Cinque Terre is inadvisable, and day trips shouldn't be undertaken if there is any threat of storms. Although yesterday's cloudburst was exceptional, and perhaps even could have occurred in summer, the region's sudden violent storms have been documented since the days of Hannibal.
I am also concerned for the ancestral of home of a frequent poster here, Vittoria, who lives in New York. The tiny hamlet where she has relatives, Framura, got a lot of water.
I am fine here, as is everywhere along the Riviera north of Deiva Marina. There was some concern about rising water in the rivers of Rapallo, but nothing that couldn't be handled. In essence, we just has a rainy day. What happened in le Cinque Terre and the val di Magra was a micro-burst. They suffered more then 20 inches of rain in less than an hour.
Here is more news about train service:
Trenitalia is publishing updates on the interruption of train service in the area of the Cinque Terre. Long-distance trains between Rome and Genoa are being re-routed inland:
Mushroom, Yes I saw a notice on my twitter account this afternoon about the floods..no mention of Framura in the accounts I saw. If you have a link that mentions Framura..please email it to me at miacasaaframura at aol.com... thanks
Have emailed cousin's kids .they are ones w/ email and facebook accts..no response yet.. .
I'm hoping that since my house is at top of hill...and cousin's Franca's home half way up the hill...(different sections of Framura go from valley to top of hill then down hill to the sea)that the flood did minumum damage. Certain that Anzo..the section near the beach and railroad got messed up.
And another cousin's mother in law lives in Monterosso..hope she is ok
When I saw the first photo of Vernazza in the OP I was amazed at how that quaint little piazza overlooking what was a tranquil harbor (when I visited last year) was just devastated. I mentally visualized a river of water running down the main street of the town to the sea. But the new batch of photos and that video (thanks for posting it JYphoto) really shows how it is way worse than anything I could imagine. I did not imagine a 10 foot deep raging river of water.
20 inches in one hour. How is that even possible? That is a mind-boggling amount of rain.
I'll send you some links to today's stories but thus far, the only mentions of Framura in the media have been to note that the autstrada exit is closed there. I think that is a good sign that Framura and Anzo didn't suffer the kind of damage seen in le Cinque Terre and above, along the Vara, and to a lesser Bonassola and Levanto. Best wishes to your family. I have read that everyone in Monterosso is safe and accounted for, although they do not have electricity. There are no reports of widespread injuries. People stayed in their houses and were safe. Someone who lives in Monterosso has an internet connection and is posting on Tripadvisor, so you might want to check there.
AWG,
My mistake. The total rainfall occurred over some 12 hours. If I'm not mistaken, Hurricane Irene dumped about half that amount of water on New Jersey and Vermont in a 24 hour period.
The biggest problem in these towns appears to be the amount of mud that will need to be removed. It is up to second-story level in some places. The coastal waters are protected for sea life and fishing, so I don't think the people there will want to just push the mud downhill, into the water. That means hauling it out uphill, to someplace the next bad rainfall can't wash it right back again. But I don't believe any of the towns lost major structures, although interiors are devastated (including an historic church in Monterosso al Mare), and several roads and a very large bridge were completely washed away.
This is certainly a terrible disaster, but the Italians are a most resilient people and seem quite able to rise from nearly any calamity - earthquakes, wars, you name it. Below I am pasting a post from an Italian resident who frequents the Slow Travel Italy Forum. I think this puts it all in perspective very nicely.
"It might seem like armageddon down there but Vernazza most definitely still exists. It's cut off right now and so is Monterosso. It will be a tough repair and clean up because, this being October/November (these things tend to happen in Liguria this time of year, this year worse than normal), the winter is upon us and with it comes inclement weather. Not so easy to get things back in order.
Remember also that in the best of times, accessibility to the Cinque Terre towns can be challenging.
But if you hear that the villages "don't exist anymore" you can assume that they mean the villages "don't exist in the same way they did before the flood". Meaning they will need to be repaired, restored, etc.
But Ligurians abandoning their properties? Not likely. Flooding and landslides have been part of living in the Ligurian hills forcenturies. This is horrible,devastating. But knowing what I know about Ligurians (a strong group of people, they are- imagine eeking out a living growing grapes on those cliffs),they will bounce back from this, one shovel full of mud at a time. Let's just hope the bad weather subsides for a good while so that the landslide areas can be stabilized."
I agree with you about Ligurians, historically some of Italy's toughest survivors, but emotions are running very high in a country where people often give their emotions an operatic expression, and are rarely afraid to show strong emotion.
Remember too that it is within living memory that Ligurians lost thousands and thousands of their native sons to emigration, and completely lost some historic centers to WW2. The abandonment of many towns in the region is a common sight. This is a real fear among people, who have watched combinations of disasters turn communities into ghost towns. In fact, some of the towns just inundated yesterday, like Sesto Godano, are known as "silent towns" by locals because they already had barely have a population left.
People also know that l'Aquila is still a mess years after its earthquake, neglected by Rome. One can only hope that a world famed tourist gem and UNESCO World Heritage Site like le Cinque Terre will receive enough help from all quarters to avoid such a fate. But on Tripadvisor, the messages coming out of Vernazza and Monterosso al Mare are both inspiring and despairing.
"The situation in Vernazza is bleak. Because it is such an isolated village the news is slow in coming. Floods have devastated the town, mud and debris arrive to at least the second floor of all buildings. ... There is no fresh water, half the town is without electricity and many are being evacuated....The talk amongst town is that it will take years to recover from the devastation. Some speculate that it might never recover and will be abandoned completely....Myself and a few others from Vernazza will be looking to raise funds to help in the rebuild."
And similar posts from Monterosso al Mare. On the Rick Steves' message board, one woman from Monterosso al Mare posted that the town had actually seen worse flooding in '66, and everyone was committed to recovery. But whether recovery can be complete is quite a hope.
I don't wish to over-dramatize the situation, but I hope no one minds if I recall that when Hurricane Katrina happened in the US, the following day's Weather-Channel type coverage were all pictures of terrible destruction, followed by reporters in windbreakers standing in the sunshine saying positive things about the community spirit and the determination to rebuild. It took several days for the formula coverage to get off the formula script and to really look at the enormity of the impact to residents forced to evacuate forever and neighborhoods lost.
Fortunately, the inundation of mud affecting a dozen or more towns in Liguria and Tuscany is not as total as it was to many parts of the Louisiana and Mississippi. But the impact on these small communities is huge -- it is hard to see how all businesses and public services like town hospitals can recover -- plus there is irreplaceable loss. I doubt Monterosso al Mare's historic church will ever be the same. Many other places in all the historic towns affected can be "rebuilt" -- but what was cherished about them was how very old and unchanged they were. I'm not sure enough money will be raised to painstakingly reconstruction them as they were.
This was Monterosso al Mare's church Tuesday:
This is the church today:
Italy's leading newspaper Il Corriere della Sera and the news channel TG7 have set up an account for anyone wishing to help the flood victims of the Cinque Terre and other affected areas.
This afternoon's news out of the region was that Vernazza is still badly isolated, and that town's less famous than Vernazza suffered more damage than had been previously been reported.
"Soldiers and civilian rescue workers battled knee-deep mud Thursday as they searched for survivors after flash floods and mudslides inundated picturesque villages around coastal areas of Liguria and Tuscany
Coast guard cutters were also called in following reports that some of the missing may have been swept into the sea by the fury of the storm. At least nine people died and six others are missing.
Many towns are still isolated nearly 48 hours after the storms hit. A military officer told Sky Italia that 500 soldiers were brought in to help in the search operation and to clear roads and bridges.
Villages like Aulla in Tuscany, where two people are confirmed dead and one is listed as missing, were covered by mud that swept into homes and stores and caked parked cars.
"In an hour the work of 10 years was lost," said the Rev. Giovanni Perrini as he inspected his parish church and nearby museum filled with mud.
In Borghetto Vara, a woman whose house was destroyed recovered her five kittens from the mud. "It is all that I have left, I have nothing else," the unidentified woman told the ANSA news agency.
I just took a look at the Slow Travel post that artsojourn referred to, and I'd like to add a bit of context. The person quoted here, who is not Italian but an American woman who lives in Piemonte, was reacting to an e-mail that wasn't quoted here. It was from an Italian hotel owner in Levanto, sometimes called the "gateway" to le Cinque Terre, who reported that Vernazza "does not exist anymore and Monterosso is covered by more than 2 mts of water , mud and stones."
I get the point of her trying to translate the Italian lament into English words that don't suggest physical structures are not standing in Vernazza or could never be repaired. But at the same time, I do think it is important at this moment to let Italians speak for themselves about what is going on their neighborhoods, and what has been lost in their eyes. Other eyewitnesses report toda that "In Vernazza at this time there is no fresh water and no gas. The concern amongst those remaining is around food, fresh water and warmth. Yesterday, helicopters and boats were in and out transporting such necessities. There is over 4 meters (over 13 feet) of mud and debris to dig out and no heavy equipment has yet to arrive. Two of the three missing Vernazzans have been found dead unfortunately."
I was reading an Italian columnist today who was born in Monterosso al Mare but now lives elsewhere. Looking at news pictures of his home town, he wrote what he called "An Elegy for Monterosso", in which he concluded:
"Nearly every stone is familiar to me, nearly every face I know. Monterosso is for me a reassuring tonic, a kind of welcoming womb that I may not ever find again after this cataclysm and the promised reconstruction. They are not at all sure that my most personal pole of reassurance will return to the dimension that in these moments it appeals to me to remember. I fear that this wound, ulicerating and thus even gross, will not never completely be healed. At least not for me."
I don't think that needs to be transformed into something sunnier. I don't like bleak facts and feelings either, but I think sometimes people need to give them voice when they face such tremendous pesonal loss. I don't think others at a distance are in a position to offer reassurances that certainly Vernazza will be able to dig out and dry out and not have to move out, or that Monterosso al Mare will be itself again.
I was able to reach my cousin Franca this morning and she told me that Framura (including the section called Anzo) don't suffer any problems. They had no phone/internet service (the kid's emails have bounced back) and no electricity for 2 days And y Yes, the autostrade is blocked and trains are stopping at Sestri Levante.
Not able to get a cousin-in law about her mother in Monterosso on the phone but France said that she was ok ..at home unab le to go downstairs cause the streets are blocked.
Monterosso is a total mess w. mud in the streets and overturned cars,etc Remembering last year having a fruit smoothie at a little hole in the cliff by the beautiful sand bech w/ a cousin and the owner's mother.
And yes Ligurians are a tough lot, they will rebuild.
y the way, glad you are back on the forum..how's the language classes going
Vittoria, thanks for checking back in with good news about the safety of your family. Struggles I have with Italian seem very minor indeed.
Lastest update from Vernazza brings me a sense of relief:
"Some heavy machinery has arrived and the digging has commenced. The focus at this time is make way for the water to flow smoothly to the sea and evacuated the older folks, children, etc. The people remaining behind are really pulling together, opening their homes to one another (as some buildings have been condemned due to instability from landslides around). Others who have left with their families to sleep nearby (ie: La Spezia) are planning to return during the days to assist in the cleanup."
Right now all weather forecasts are for dry and warm-ish weather until next Wednesday, which can only help.
One more observation on the importance of Italian rhetoric, and then I will drop the subject:
The Italian newspaper La Repubblica ran a commentary this evening that bore the headline: "Le Cinque Terre, the beauty sung by poets, swept away in mud." The article then went on to recount the immense importance of le Cinque Terre as an inspiration to the nation's greatest poets (Dante, Boccaccio, Petrarch) and its meaning as a symbol to the world of Italy, the the Beautiful Country. It said its vistas were essential to the identity of Italy, as important as the val d'Orcia, the Amalfi Coast and the Dolomiti, embodying for all the world to see Italy's amazing unity of nature, history and culture. The article called upon people to remember that le Cinque Terre's ancient wallls and vinyard terraces are a UNESCO World Heritage Site and a protected national park, and that its world-famous walks of love united the separate five villages into a single united community, in a fragile place. It called the mudslides a calamity.
I can't help but think that what sounds like over-dramatizing to foreign ears is the way in which Italians preserve their culture, their heritage. It is by reminding themselves in no uncertain terms just how historic and valuable their landscape is, and what great meaning it has to the human beings who experience it. The mayor of Monterosso yesterday was in tears when he told reporters: "All the people have left!" They of course had to leave -- he told them to go! -- because without water and heat and sanitation, it wasn't safe to stay. But when the people all leave a town in italy, the town is desolate. It is no more. It is a calamity.
This afternoon, on my way to catch a bus, I happened upon the end of a town funeral, the casket being wheeled out the church and placed in a hearse. The hearse then proceeded down the street followed by nearly everybody in town, on foot, two strong people on each side of the very old widow at the front of the line. The procession was moving so slowly, taking up the whole street, that I realized that when my bus arrived, it would end up crawling behind this slow-moving crowd, and it was going to make me late.
The bus arrived soon, and I did get on, but to my surprise, the procession ended at the front door of the widow's house at the other end of the street, not the distant cemetery. Everybody in town had simply walked their neighbor back home. The hearse went on its way, and so did the bus.
I think we Americans, even when we visit Italy repeatedly or even live here, need constant reminders of the depth of Italian culture when it comes to connecting with people and place. Our culture is so different. We sell our houses, we "hi-ho" our neighbors from our driveways, we make appointments to see each other, and by the end of hour or so, we want a happy ending.
In little towns like Monterosso al Mare or Vernazza, you see everyone you know every day. Everybody talks to everybody. Almost everybody lives in a house their grandfather or great-grandfather lived in and died in. When I rented my furnished apartment, my landlady pointed to the huge double bed that came with it and said "I was born there!"
When all that washes away, and your neighbors have to pack up go to La Spezia, even though that is just 20 minutes away, something is truly no more.
I don’t think it sounds like “over-dramatization” at all. Even if rebuilding is possible, experiencing this type of destruction to your home and hometown, is crushing to the spirit.
I am fortunate enough to live at the top of a high hill, but in my neck of the woods we just experienced a “100 year” flood (last month after Irene and the tropical storm that followed a week later) for the second time in just 5 years. I have many friends who live in the nearby small valley towns that rebuilt after the heartbreaking floods of 2006 and now watched it all wash away again. These are also resilient “hardy” folk, but this time you can see the deep despair in their eyes. When I now meet with people who took it all in stride in the past, you can see the hurt on their faces because they feel like their town will never be the same (it won’t). Like the tiny Ligurian towns effected today in CT, the people in these small towns have the same sense of community and of “place” that is lacking in much of urban/suburban America. I think it is a small town thing.
I am not trying to match tragedies here, I only mentioned this to say that I understand how devastated the people of a tiny town like Vernazza must feel when it all suddenly washes away. And yes, I think it is different when you live in a town small enough that you literally know everyone.
Thanks for posting these updates. I will be looking for more hopeful news coming from Vernazza and the other towns.
