Flooding, roads transformed into rivers of water and mud, submerged cars and landslides which have forced the fire brigade to deal with dozens of calls in the last few hours across much of the regional territory: this is the first assessment of the new wave of bad weather which has hit Lombardy, heralded yesterday afternoon by rain made red by the sand of the Sahara.
A violent storm broke out in Milan starting at 9.30 pm on Sunday evening, causing for the first time the cancellation of the traditional concert of the Filarmonica della Scala scheduled in Piazza Duomo and also partially ruining the final Dance Night of the great event “Party like a Deejay” at the Arco della Pace.
As for the rest of Lombardy, the provinces most affected were those of Brescia and Cremona, where numerous floods occurred.
The fire brigade teams were mobilized to deal with emergency situations and six teams from Emilia Romagna also arrived to support their Lombard colleagues.
Rescue operations are still underway and the firefighters are doing everything possible to assist the population.
In the Brescia area, the greatest disruptions occurred in the Franciacorta, Sebino and West Brescia areas, as well as in Valtrompia: a stream flooded in Rodengo Saiano and various roads ended up under water between Chiari, Rovato (where yesterday evening the area of the A4 motorway toll booth looked like a river in flood) and Gussago, with some cars stuck in the underpasses.
“Fortunately there was no harm to anyone, but this time the fury of the water left its mark. A disaster – Giovanni Coccoli, mayor of Gussago wrote on social media – The images of this night will remain imprinted in me forever: seeing so much destruction, flooded houses, mud, debris, logs in the streets carried by the water as if they were toothpicks hurts , but there is no time to feel sorry for ourselves, discouragement cannot take over.”
The mayor of Gussago also wanted to publicly thank “our technicians, the firefighters and the workers who worked all night as much as possible for first emergency interventions”, but also “the volunteers of the Paths Group who from 10pm have been were on duty and the boys from our oratory who immediately made themselves available with shovels to free some houses from the mud”.
According to the Meteopassione association, specialized in monitoring meteorological phenomena in the Brescia area, “the rainfall accumulations on some of our control units exceeded 80 mm”.
Firefighters also worked throughout the night in Cremona, where they had to free underpasses, roads and cellars from the water and remove unsafe trees.
However, the meteorological situation is not destined to improve soon: according to Arpa Lombardia the weather will remain unreliable at the beginning of the week with local downpours and a new “heavy” passage of rain and thunderstorms is expected for Wednesday 12 June. Only after that date could an improvement occur.
