Customer: «Can I go to the bathroom?». Bartender: «If you find it flooded, be patient». Voice from the register: “I’ve already cleaned it twice this morning.”
Bar Mercurio, 1pm on Wednesday. Lambro Bridge, on the edge of the city. Far Southeast. Here, Milan ends: and the border is marked by this torrent which until the 1970s swallowed up all the solvents, metals and poisoned waste from Lombardy’s industry; while now, from a filthy gutter, it has turned into a muddy river with the water level above the vault of the bridge.
At 3pm the traffic police closed the traffic as a precaution. Via Camaldoli is the last street in the city and, dividing the asphalt from the river, there is only a 1.80 meter high reinforced concrete wall. So much rain has fallen that the water of the Lambro now exceeds the street level. “If it comes out here it’s a disaster,” mutters an elderly man. For now he’s holding on. The semi-disaster (in addition to the four trees fallen in the city, a couple of flooded underpasses, streets with knee-deep water around the Sempione park, some diverted public transport lines and a chain of cancellations on regional trains) materialized little more southern. Rilke Street: the street in Milan where every inhabitant, next to his slippers, keeps his rubber boots. And where the manholes regurgitated water for hoursfrom dawn, urban geysers (170 people remain without electricity in the evening).
Situation in the morning: the clearing is a lake. An exhibitionist gets filmed while simulates surfing. Four people taken from home by fire brigade divers (a woman who had to undergo dialysis, three elderly people as a precaution); one and a half meters of water in the cellars; three civil protection water pumps trying to empty them; distribution of sandbags, with some skirmishes. Botta: «Wow, what are you doing, taking them away?». And answer: «Why, don’t we at Umiliati have the right?». Humiliati is the next street. People in galoshes. People in flip flops. Everyone is soaked.
I look into a small window at sidewalk height: two Filipino women with small containers fill a plastic bucket. How many have you brought out since this morning? “About twenty”. Single room, water at mattress level. Area of great poverty: families also live in basements with dubious habitability. Condominium next door: «We have three pumps of 300 cubic meters per minute. This is how we save garages. This stuff happens all the time here.” They also use bulkheads. Equipped like in Venice. This desolate strip of rich Milan, however, has only high water in common with the lagoon.
Hours pass. Rain paused, uphill warning. Why from Northern Lombardy water pours upon water. The Lambro overflows into the Monza park, flooding it like a rice field. It invades car parks and cellars. The Municipality closes the bridges. To the inhabitants: “Do not use the car.” A couple of kindergartens evacuated. The prefecture of Milan opens the coordination center. Anas closes a piece of the A4 towards Brescia. Trains blocked on the Milan-Lecco line. The firefighters manage one hundred interventions. The Municipality of Milan rules: «The Seveso will overflow».
Here is the Seveso, another legacy of the ruthless urbanization of the post-war period: it enters Milan from the North, they decided to intubate him in a concrete canal, to build on it. For more than half a century, the ferocity of the current has exploded from the manholes, flooding a large slice of the city, from Niguarda to Isola, the neo-chic neighborhood at the foot of the new skyscrapers. To contain the Seveso, they finally built a tank (two more are needed): Wednesday morning is used. It accommodates 270 thousand cubic meters of water. Ten hours of salvation. But at 5pm the gigantic basin is full. So: geyser manholes here too. However, the flood was foreseen, therefore managed, controlled in some way.
The centre-right Milanese councilors attack the council: “The manholes are not being cleaned.” Mayor Beppe Sala instead indicates a structural theme: «The city must be protected, but the tanks must be built not in Milan, so sometimes there are problems with the upstream municipalities and with the Region».
In the evening, live Radio Italia concert. Bomb or no (water) bomb, the mass of the public pours into Piazza del Duomo.
