Italy was in the grips of extreme weather including heavy rainfall, strong winds and avalanches on Monday, with cyclone Fedra raging especially in the north.
Two regions, Emilia Romagna and Piemonte, were on orange alert for bad weather and 13 – Abruzzo, Basilicata, Calabria, Campania, Molise, Apulia, Lazio, Lombardy, Sardinia, Sicily, Tuscany, Umbria and Veneto – were on the lower yellow level.
In the north-western Alpine Val d’Aosta region, more than 6,000 people living in the upper Gressoney valley have been isolated since Sunday due to avalanches.
Further south in the Tyrrhenian coastal region of Liguria landslides were reported in and around Genoa.
Evacuations in Piemonte
Over 70 people were evacuated from their homes in Venaus in Piemonte’s Val de Susa on Monday as a precautionary measure due to the danger of avalanches.
Around 30 people were receiving assistance from the municipal authorities and civil protections volunteers at a local multipurpose centre.
In San Raffaele Cimena, part of the Turin metropolitan city area, 20 people living in two separate hamlets were cut off due to a landslide.
Usseglio was also isolated due to a landslide on provincial road 23 leading to Lemie.
On Monday the avalanche risk was at level 4 – High on the danger scale throughout the Piemonte Alps.
River Po rises by two metres
The level of Italy’s longest river rose by two metres in the last 24 hours at the Crescentino Po hydrometer near the Piemonte city of Turin area. Farmers’ association Coldiretti cited data from the Po River Interregional Agency AIPO.
Further east in the Lombardy region Lake Garda, Italy’s biggest lake, was said to be close to its historical highest level for the period.
Coldiretti also said 50 extreme weather events including cloudbursts and windstorms have hit Italy in the last week.
The association further added that the high frequency of extreme events, unseasonal weather and the quick switch from hot to cooler bad weather confirm the trend towards tropicalisation whose impact is compounded by construction and land consumption.
Boy killed in South Tyrol avalanche
A16-year-old boy died on Sunday after being hit by an avalanche while skiing off-piste at Plan in Val Passiria in the northern South Tyrol region.
The victim is said to have been on his own and his family raised the alarm on Sunday evening when he failed to return home.
The avalanche risk along the Italy-Austria border in this part of South Tyrol is currently at level 3 (considerable) out of 5 on the European Avalanche Danger Scale.
Sunday’s casualty is the second person to have died due to an avalanche in the region in recent days.
