Flooding over the weekend in Sicily, follows weeks of severe weather across Italy where the death toll has now risen to 30
Italy has been struck by severe weather across the whole country causing widespread damage. To date, 30 casualties have died as a result of flood waters, landslides, and major wind damage with many more injured.
Strong winds and high tides combined to cause major flooding in Venice, with high tide levels reaching 156cm, the highest since 2008, and the fourth highest ever, at a cost of over 1 billion euros.
The strong winds, some up to 190 km per hour (118 mph) have also destroyed around 14 million trees across the country, including the famous “violin forest” that provided wood for the famous Stradivarius violins.
Italian Prime Minister, Giuseppe Conte, said on his FaceBook Page; “Our Peninsula has been plagued by particularly violent weather events for weeks. First Calabria, Sicily and Sardinia, then from 27 October the Veneto, Friuli Venezia Giulia, the provinces of Trento and Bolzano, as well as Liguria and Lazio. The wind and intense rainfall caused victims and huge damage. Already in the past few days the toll was tragic: 17 dead people, many evacuated families, whole destroyed territories.
The rainfall of the last hours especially in Sicily increases the tragic toll: 12 new deaths and a dispersed in the province of Palermo and in the agrigento.
We must thank the speedy intervention of the civil protection service and the entire rescue machine to rescue the population and have guaranteed interventions to restore damaged infrastructure to allow the recovery, as quickly as possible, of normal living conditions.”
