The damage in several mountainous areas of Piedmont has prompted regional president Alberto Cirio to call for a state of emergency to be declared due to the damage caused by the bad weather.
Between Saturday and Sunday, intense storms, rain and hail devastated several mountainous areas in the regions of Piedmont and Aosta Valley in northern Italy, causing flooding, landslides and the evacuation of people in emergency situations.
According to local media, cited by EFE, rescue teams have taken dozens of people trapped in a mountain refuge in Macugnana, Piedmont, by helicopter, where flooding caused by heavy rains caused two streams in the area to overflow.
Nearly 100 people were also evacuated on Saturday night from two points in the region, where the water overflowed and flooded the streets of residential areas.
The damage in several mountainous areas of Piedmont led the regional president, Alberto Cirio, to request the declaration of a state of emergency due to the damage caused by the bad weather.
“Our technicians are working and arriving at the affected areas for a first assessment of the damage and to carry out the first urgent interventions with the municipalities,” Cirio reported, while images of cars with broken windows due to the intense hail and some vehicles trapped in water currents.
Another 200 people were also evacuated by helicopter on Sunday in the Cogne Valley, Val d’Aosta, after the only road in the area was damaged by heavy flooding on Saturday. Most of the people evacuated were residents and tourists.
Local media have released images of a road affected by landslides due to flooding in Cogne, a valley that is almost completely isolated for now.
According to media reports, firefighters have had to carry out around 80 rescues in the last few hours due to landslides and other incidents following the damage in the mountainous area in northern Italy.
At the same time, the top floor of a house in the region was completely destroyed by strong gusts of wind.
On Saturday night, in the Piedmont town of Montanaro, emergency teams had to intervene to rescue a family who were in a car, trapped after a nearby stream overflowed.
According to Angelo Bonelli, a deputy from the opposition Green-Left Alliance, what happened is one more sign of the “signs of the climate crisis” that the Italian government headed by Giorgia Meloni “continues to deny and never addresses.”
“Storms, floods and hail are hitting the Aosta Valley and Piedmont, while the south of our country is devastated by drought,” Bonelli lamented. The politician urged the government to declare “a state of climate crisis” and “invest resources to address it.”
Source: Observadora
