High water in Venice, submerged city. Piazza San Marco flooded. Gusts in the middle per hour: a dead electrocuted man

Venice is a completely submerged city. There is no longer Piazza San Marco. There are no calli or campielli. The foundations that run along the canals look like stones from Atlantis. The sea has entered the lagoon. He rose to a level never reached, except in 1966, when there was the terrible Aqua Granda of 194 centimeters. The sea has become confused with the stagnant and greenish waters of the historical center, it has covered the lights of the arches of the bridges. The sea, driven by the sirocco, made more pregnant by the rain, has risen, risen, for hours. At a steady pace. Three, four, five centimeters every ten minutes. He forced the men of the Centro Maree who hadn't slept for days to constantly revise the estimates, looking at each other astounded. One meter is 50. One meter is 60. One meter is 70. And shortly after the chilling projection: one meter and 90 centimeters. What is going to happen they asked the guardians of the waves? It happens that the second highest tide ever took Venice.

At 22.50 on 12 November 2019, a date that will enter the statistics of the next half century, the hydrometers, at the Punta della Salute, on the side of the Grand Canal, stopped at 187 centimeters above the mid-sea. Seven centimeters less than the tragic record of 53 years ago. A 78-year-old man died of electrocution on the island of Pellestrina, one of the tongues of land that divide Venice from the sea. To cause the death of the elderly would have been an electrical short circuit triggered by the tide that had entered his home. Another person has life in the violent storm probably due to natural causes.

The mild Adriatic, driven by gusts of wind of one hundred kilometers per hour, showed all the fragility of Venice. It has humiliated her. He took over the shops and the ground floors of the houses, floated the walkways and garbage, bar tables and chairs. In a game of illusionism he leveled everything, giving the impression that the buildings had shortened, that the roofs of the buildings and of the churches had lowered by two meters, reached indefensible windows, overcame useless doors, altered for once again the extraordinary balance that has allowed Venice to exist so far.

"Here is a disaster," said Mayor Luigi Brugnaro, while on a local police boat he walked the stretch from the Rialto Bridge to the Marcian Basilica, similar to a stretch of sea. "Venice continues to be distressed by these exceptional waters. It happened last year, the same year. We ask the government to participate ". In reality, in 2018 the maximum point stopped at 156 centimeters, 31 centimeters less. Then Brugnaro talked about the Mose, the great work that should save Venice, but that in sixteen years has not yet ended. "We ask the government to understand at what level is the organization of the Mose. Because here we risk not making it anymore. Now we will ask for the state of city calamity and we ask that they give us a hand because the costs will be high ". Looking around, with his feet soaked, the mayor, visibly moved, said: "Unfortunately we have reached another negative record. We need everyone to give us a hand and we are united to address what are obviously the effects of climate change. Now we understand that the Mose is needed and that we must get caught finishing it. " Then the operational announcement. Schools of every order and grade closed for a day. "Also because we expect another peak in the morning and it's better for people to stay at home."

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