Heavy snow batters northern Italy

Friday was a hard day for northern Italy, where many cities woke up covered in snow and had to cope with major traffic disruption and severe inconvenience for the population...

Freezing temperatures, heavy snows and strong winds caused icing highways, blocked rail lines and temporary closure of the Bologna airport. Authorities ordered many schools to remain closed.

"Indeed precipitations were intense in some northern regions, namely Emilia Romagna, Liguria and Piedmont," Colonel Guido Guidi, weather and climate expert of the Italian Air Force, told Xinhua.

Not only many areas were under a thick blanket of snow, but strong wings and coastal storms also added to the scourge of bad weather.

Water city Venice was flooded by tides which reached a height of 124 cm above sea level, according to local reports.

Strong winds toppled trees and made some parts of buildings and infrastructures collapse. Aid squads had to intervene and rescue dozens of people in difficulty across northern Italy.

Civil authorities warned residents in various towns to move to the highest levels of their homes and park vehicles as high as possible, after flooding claimed numerous victims in the past months.

Three elderly people in Lombardy region, of which the capital is Milan, were reported to have died on Friday after suffering heart attacks while removing snow from their homes. Five others were suddenly taken ill.

Guidi underlined, however, that the precipitation was regular.

"We are talking about snow in the winter season. Some Italian media have named this wave of bad weather as 'big snow' but if we look at 1929, when a lot of snow also came down, we can find exactly the same words on the then media reports," he noted.

"Friday's weather was the result of a pipeline of cold air coming from Siberia and the Arctic," a climatologist of the Institute of Biometeorology of the national Research Council (IBIMET-CNR), Marina Baldi, explained to Xinhua.

Baldi expected the weather to improve from Sunday, when the Azores anticyclone, a large-scale circulation of winds typically found south of the Azores in the Atlantic Ocean, whose effects include clearing skies, will move toward east.

She agreed with Guidi that the wave of bad weather was "not exceptional" but in line with the variability and temperatures experienced in the past, while also mentioning a certain influence of climate change on the milder winters and summer heatwaves registered over the last 10-15 years.

"For the next decades, we can expect an increase of extreme weather events and torrential rainfall within short timespans in Italy, with consequent more frequent flooding," Baldi concluded.
  Source: Xinhua - globaltimes.cn
7/2/15
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Big Ships Will Soon Be Banned From Venice's Historic Center

ROME (AP) — Italy has moved ahead with plans to block big cruise ships from sailing past Venice's historic center, authorizing an environmental study for an alternate route that it hopes will still satisfy the city's key tourism industry.

Cruise ships currently can pass within 300 meters (1,000 feet) of Venice's iconic St. Mark's Square, granting a stunning view to those aboard but presenting a jarring sight against the backdrop of Venice's Byzantine architecture.

Residents, activists and environmentalists have long opposed cruise ship traffic in Venice.
They balked at the decision Friday by a commission of government ministers and local officials authorizing a study into using the Contorta-Sant'Angelo canal.

The group "No Big Ships" called it the worst choice and insisted that big cruise ships must be kept out of the lagoon altogether.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/12/ships-banned-venice_n_5671549.html
12/8/14
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Related:

• Στη Βενετία απαγόρευσαν τις μηχανοκίνητες βάρκες

• Domenica ecologica: prima volta per il centro storico 

Πλημμύρισε η ιστορική πόλη της Βενετίας(27/10/12)

Acqua Alta Venezia, 130 cm sul livello medio mare 

( 27 ottobre 2012)

Με αδιάβροχες μπότες κινούνται τουρίστες αλλά και ντόπιοι στο ιστορικό κέντρο της Βενετίας, το οποίο πλημμύρισε από τις καταρρακτώδεις βροχές (27/10/12). Όπως βλέπετε η στάθμη του νερού έχει ανέβει τόσο που καθιστά δύσκολη τη μετακίνηση. 

Η εικόνα ωστόσο προσελκύει την προσοχή των τουριστών, οι οποίοι με φωτογραφικές μηχανές απαθανατίζουν την διαφορετική όψη του ιστορικού κέντρου.

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[2] Oct. 28 - High waters hit Venice, leaving large parts of the historical center flooded and tourists wading through knee-deep water. Rough Cut 

reuters.com/video

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New satellite data reveals sea-level rise

The city of Venice is investing billions in a new flood defence system to protect against sea level rises

(CNN) -- Sea-levels are rising unevenly around the world, with Pacific countries in particular suffering significant increases over the past two decades, according to accurate new satellite data.

On average, global sea-levels have been rising at about three millimeters (mm) a year, however, this masks large differences between regions of the world.

While some regions have seen sea-level rises of 12 mm a year, others have actually seen decreases of about 12 mm a year.

The results are based on radar readings from the European Space Agency (ESA) over an 18-year period from October 1992 to March 2010.

ESA used its satellites to send radar pulses to the sea surface below, recording the time delay in its return and creating a precise measurement of their height above the surface.

Special report: Sea-level rises

Scientists say sea-level rises are the result of the expansion of water due to rising temperatures, melting of glaciers and the melting of polar ice sheets.

Annual mean global sea-level changes 1992-2010 (ESA)

 

The worst hit regions over the past two decades, according to the ESA data, have been the Pacific countries of Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Philippines and vulnerable Pacific islands like the Solomon Islands.

The Philippines for one is already frequently subjected to flooding and landslides caused by heavy rain, with seasonal monsoon rains in August killing at least 11 people.

Scientists suggest regions that have seen high sea level rises over the past 20 years will not necessarily continue to see higher than average sea-level rises in the future.

"We suspect that the bigger the differences get, the more they will tend to level out in the future," says Robert Meisner, a spokesperson for ESA.

However, a recent study of coastal cities still predicted the Philippines' capital Manila would see its vulnerability to flooding double by the end of the century, due to sea-level rises.

In some regions of the world, the increasingly accurate sea level data is being used by planners to mitigate against the risk of flooding.

See also: Five cities battling flooding, heats and storms

In Venice, where the sea-level data was released, engineers are constructing a new set of tidal barriers to protect the historic city.

The city, which attracts millions of tourists every year, is seeing sea-level rises of around 2 mm per year, together with slow, mostly natural, subsidence of about another 2 mm every year.

The new $7.9 billion-barrier system will see giant barriers placed on the sea floor around Venice. When the water levels rise, air will be pumped into the barriers raising them up to block the tidal flow and protect the city from flooding.

The system is due to be completed in 2014 and is expected to be able to protect the city for the next 20 years.

http://edition.cnn.com/2012/10/02/tech/satellites-sea-level-rise/index.html

3/10/12