Antonio Piccirilli
The weather-hydro alert on Emilia Romagna already devastated by floods has also been extended for Friday 19 May. According to forecasts, rainfall in the region will (fortunately) be scarce or absent, but given the water that has fallen in recent days, the risk of landslides remains high. “The red hydraulic and hydrogeological criticality in the Bologna area and Romagna is due to the serious criticalities already present in the area” explains the regional civil protection, specifying that light rain is expected on Friday 19 May in the central-western sector of the region. The alert code will be red in the Bologna area and on the Romagna coast, yellow, orange or green in the rest of the region (see infographic below).
The regions on yellow and orange alert in the rest of the peninsula
The national civil protection communicates that the orange code for hydraulic risk will also concern part of Lombardy, specifically the lower eastern plain which borders Emilia Romagna, while again for hydraulic risk a yellow alert has been evaluated on the coastal area of Molise.
The bulletin then provides yellow alert for hydrogeological risk on part of Piedmont and Abruzzo and on Marche, Molise and Basilicata, as well as on a small portion of the Apennines in Tuscany. For Friday 19 May, no warning was issued instead connected to the risk of thunderstorms and storms. In fact, a day of severe bad weather is not expected, even if there will still be some rainfall in the Northwest, especially in Piedmont, and in part of the Center, i.e. Tuscany, other Lazio and Umbria.
Why the alert is triggered even if it doesn’t rain (or it rains little)
For the next 24 hours, therefore, the forecasts are not so worrying, while there are some more apprehensions in view of the weekend. So what are the civil protection bulletins due to? As explained by Monia Monni, councilor for the environment in Tuscany, “the alert is not a weather forecast, but a progressive system of activation of the regional and local civil protection service, aimed at preventing as many damages as possible deriving from the impact of weather events on the territory”. In particular, in Tuscany the risk is ‘hydrogeological and hydraulic of the minor network’, i.e. a “risk associated with landslides, mudslides or flooding of secondary watercourses” said the councilor in response to those who were “amazed to see the clear sky”.
In short, we should not expect the flood every time a weather alert, but instead it is useful to carefully consult the bulletins (here you find that of national civil protection) to understand in detail what are the critical issues that could occur.
The alert in Emilia Romagna
However, eyes are once again focused on Emilia Romagna, affected in these hours by dozens and dozens of landslides. The regional civil protection announces that for Friday “the floods already underway are expected to spread in the valley stretches of all the watercourses in the central-eastern sector of the region, with the floodplains occupied and the banks affected, in progressive decline”.
From the point of view of hydrogeological criticality, the note reads, “widespread instability will be possible in the central-eastern mountain/hilly areas of the region, where favorable conditions will remain for the development of landslides due to sliding and flowing along the slopes characterized by fragile and to the aggravation of the numerous landslides already activated following the rainfall of the past few days. Furthermore, localized landslide phenomena will be possible in the western mountain / hilly areas “.