«I feel like crying when I think that we have lost everything. Our business was inaugurated just a year ago. So much work destroyed in just one night.” Maria Rita Pella is the owner of Alimentari Glaciera shop located just one hundred meters away from the Town Hall square. This is the area most affected by theTambach River flooding, which crosses Staffa, the heart of Macugnaga (Verbano Cusio Ossola). With the heavy rains yesterday, June 29, in the evening (around 11.30 pm) the river began to overflow its banks, reaching neighboring businesses and houses.
«Last night it was impossible to leave the house, the river was scary – explains Pella -. This morning, at first light, my daughter and I reached the shop. In the warehouse the water had exceeded 2 meters in height. We started working to clean everything up, but even now water continues to come into the shop. It will take days to restore the situation. And, like us, several businesses and homes were damaged.”
Maria Rita Pella, while trying to save what can be saved, launches an appeal to the institutions: «I speak to the Piedmont Region: don’t forget us. It is already difficult to live in the mountains, for a whole series of issues. Plus we also have to suffer these kinds of disasters. Help us concretely to restart, otherwise we don’t know what else to do». His family business was among the hardest hit. The damage has not yet been calculated, but we are probably talking about thousands of euros.
In this situation, however, there was no lack of support from the citizens of Macugnaga and nearby towns. «What amazed me was the solidarity of the people – he says -. We made an appeal on social media because we were looking for plastic boxes, useful for recovering what we could and transferring what we collected to another warehouse. Many people went to the store with the boxes: we collected about a hundred. This gesture reassured us a lot, but now it is necessary for the institutions to take action».
Meanwhile, the Civil Protection and Fire Brigade vehicles are at work remove mud and debris in the street. «Fortunately no one was injured and no one was missing – he says Alessandro Bonacci, mayor of Macugnaga -. Yesterday we witnessed a first water bomb. Then came a second one, which lasted practically three hours. After 11 pm the Tambach started to flood, as well as the Horlovono stream that overflowed its banks».
The water invaded the town, also putting the state road and all the municipal roads of Staffa and Pecetto out of service. “Four high-altitude shelters were isolated last night due to the flooding of another river, the Anza. We started evacuating this morning. We are talking about hundreds of people who were brought back down to the valley by helicopter.” A massive presence of tourists also because these days in Macugnaga The Monterosa Est Himalayan Trail was taking place, the high altitude race which had around 500 participants. It is impossible to quantify the damage estimate to date. «But between public and private – says Bonacci – we are talking about millions of euros».
