Torrential rain earlier this week killed 14 people, turning the streets of towns and villages across the Emilia-Romagna region into roaring rivers, and with more rain regional authorities have extended a state of high alert.
Meloni leaves the Summit of Seven
In a sign of the difficulty of the crisis, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni announced on Saturday that she would leave the G7 summit in Japan early to oversee the management of the emergency situation. Meloni said: “Frankly, I cannot stay away from Italy in such a complicated situation”, and thanked the 5,000 rescuers and volunteers who helped those affected by the floods. Meloni is expected to visit some of the hardest hit areas on Sunday.
Mass destruction
In just 36 hours, the amount of rain normally recorded in 6 months fell on the Emilia-Romagna region. The floods have been described as the country’s worst in a century. The floods caused more than 305 landslides and damaged or closed more than 500 roads in the region. Bologna Mayor Matteo Lepore said on Saturday that repairing roads and infrastructure would take months, even years in some places. Nearly two dozen streams and rivers in the southeastern Emilia-Romagna region overflowed after heavy rains earlier this week, inundating entire neighborhoods and farmlands. “With 6 months of rain falling in 36 hours when it rained two weeks ago, no region can contain it,” Emilia-Romagna Governor Stefano Bonaccini told local media. Bonaccini claimed there was about “two billion dollars worth of damage, and the earth is no longer absorbing anything”. The heavy rains came following a drought that affected large areas of northern Italy last winter, in addition to a record sparse rain last summer that affected agricultural crops. The Italian Armed Forces and Coast Guard joined the emergency efforts and deployed helicopters to rescue people from their homes and rubber dinghies to reach besieged homes from all directions.
Climate change and other factors
Although this record rainfall and the resulting flooding and torrential rains are linked to changing patterns of natural weather phenomena due to climatic extremes, it is not possible, according to experts, to blame them directly.
Ramadan Hamza, an academic and expert in water policies and strategies, said in an interview with Sky News Arabia:
“The heavy rains, which averaged almost 8 inches in some Italian regions in less than 48 hours, are an unprecedented weather phenomenon.” “This explains the occurrence of catastrophic floods, which are also caused by the fact that the region had previously been exposed to thunderstorms which caused the region to become saturated, leading to damage and erosion of many banks. ” “What also contributed to the worsening flooding in lowland areas was the occurrence of dozens of landslides in mountainous areas.” “Flooding is a complex phenomenon that occurs due to a number of factors and causes including the geological nature of the terrain, human activity, erosion of drainage structures, etc. Therefore, linking l The occurrence of such floods at climate change alone may not be entirely accurate, requiring in-depth analysis by experts and specialists.” “Since man-made changes are undoubtedly a major cause, as climate change leads to exacerbation of heavy rains, which are extreme weather events, governments around the world must take more precautionary measures and prepare cope well with these disasters, which will lessen the impact of their repercussions. and its devastating effects. “Among these preparations is carrying out more precise and detailed surveys of dam projects, infrastructure and hydraulic systems, to deal with the devastating impact of frequent torrential rains and subsequent torrential floods. , which follow long periods of drought.”
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