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Record flood water levels in Venice hit again on Sunday making this the worst week of flooding in the city in over 50 years.
<p>Venice's tide office recorded the peak tide of 1.5 meters above sea level just after 1 p.m. local time UTC.</p><p>The new peak left 70 percent of the <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/after-the-floods-could-venice-lose-its-world-heritage-status/a-51271328" target="_blank">UNESCO World Heritage city</a> submerged on Sunday.</p>
<p><em>Reposted with permission from <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/venice-third-exceptional-flood-makes-week-worst-on-record/a-51286635?maca=en-VAM_volltext_ecowatch-28485-html-copypaste" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Deutsche Welle</a>.</em><br/></p>
<p>Since records began in 1872, that level has never been reached even twice in one year. There is no other week on record where waters have reached the 1.5-meter mark three times in one week.</p><p>Usually, tides of 80-90 centimeters are considered high.</p><p><a href="https://www.dw.com/en/venice-fresh-floods-force-closure-of-st-marks-square/a-51264902" target="_blank">St. Mark's Square</a> — the lowest point in the city and home of the iconic St. Mark's Basilica — <a href="https://www.dw.com/en/venice-floods-st-marks-square-reopens-but-city-on-red-alert/a-51278731" target="_blank">was submerged again</a> and closed to tourists.</p><p>Museums and stores in hardest-hit areas also remained closed.</p><p>Hundreds of volunteers mobilized to help Venice's inhabitants and to protect iconic buildings in the city, which is world-famous for its canals, historic architecture and art.</p>
<p>Mayor Luigi Brugnaro, who has also been appointed special commissioner to deal with the emergency, pleaded with citizens not to give up hope, saying, "Venetians only get on their knees to pray."<br></p><p>Earlier in the week the city declared a state of emergency and ministers pledged €20 million ($22 million) to address the immediate damage.</p><p>Other parts of Italy also experienced severe weather during the weekend, with the river Arno in Pisa threatening to burst it banks.</p>
Why has Venice flooded?
<p>Experts say that Venice is both sinking into the mud it was built on and is at threat from rising sea levels due to <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">climate change</a>.</p><p>The flooding has renewed calls for the Mose flood barrier project for the city.</p>From Your Site Articles
- 70% of Venice Flooded by Highest Tide in at Least a Decade ... ›
- Veneto Council Flooded Two Minutes After Rejecting Climate Action ... ›
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Veneto Council Flooded Two Minutes After Rejecting Climate Action, Councilor Says
15 November 2019
Climate
A flooded St. Mark's square (Piazza San Marco) during a new exceptional high tide on Nov. 15 in Venice, Italy. Simone Padovani / Awakening / Getty Images
The historic "acqua alta" that swamped Venice Tuesday night also flooded the Veneto regional council for the first time, just moments after it had apparently rejected measures to address the climate crisis.
<p>The council chamber, which is located on Venice's Grand Canal in the Ferro Fini Palace, began to flood around 10 p.m. Tuesday, <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2019/11/14/europe/veneto-council-climate-change-floods-trnd-intl-scli/index.html" target="_blank">CNN reported</a>. At the time, the councilors were discussing the 2020 budget for the northeastern Italian region of Veneto, of which Venice is the capital.</p><p>"Ironically, the chamber was flooded two minutes after the majority League, Brothers of Italy, and Forza Italia parties rejected our amendments to tackle climate change," Democratic Party councilor and environment committee deputy chairman Andrea Zanoni wrote in a Facebook post reported by CNN.</p><p>The League and Brothers of Italy are far-right parties, and Forza Italia is a center-right party, <a href="https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/venice-council-chambers-flood-moments-after-rejecting-climate-change-amendments_us_5dcddcb1e4b01f982efef03b?ri18n=true&guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAC1nDeCLQrkax5gONQhGwLiQUL8R9ocQ27ZLKee3EJwkhH6FL1768LjQBqpAht4P4fHMNj1iMwBlQtPG5u5gpA1geqYETelTmswKx94ylHpo2O2FU8HapFj8kZvKyn97wHPVUUQfk1NTJJwUZ3M4JKPv8mQUtAUr1YU1I7CV_ojH" target="_blank">HuffPost explained</a>.</p>
<div class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="8d12ae0b4547f47c04ca46bce2ec00e1"><div class="fb-post" data-href="https://www.facebook.com/andreazanonix/posts/10159116946155299"></div></div>
<p>The rejected amendments included plans to fund <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/renewable-energy/" target="_self">renewable energy</a>, replace diesel buses with cleaner and more efficient vehicles, replace high-polluting stoves and tackle <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/plastic-pollution" target="_self">plastic pollution</a>, Zanoni said.</p><p>Zanoni further said that Veneto regional president and League member Luca Zaia presented a budget "with no concrete actions to combat climate change," CNN reported.</p><p>Zanoni joined Venice Mayor Luigi Brugnaro in blaming climate change for Venice's massive <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/flooding" target="_self">flooding</a> Tuesday, according to HuffPost, though he acknowledged it was one of many factors responsible. The city saw its highest tide in more than 50 years when water levels peaked at more than six feet.</p>
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<p>"If the voters of Veneto continue to close their eyes, Zaia's League will bring us all underwater," Zanoni said, according to HuffPost.</p><p>Regional council spokesman Alessandro Ovizach confirmed to CNN that the flooding occurred during the 2020 budget discussion, but did not specify which budget items were being addressed at the time.</p><p>But council president and League member Roberto Ciambetti disputed Zanoni's depiction of the council's actions on climate.</p><p>"Beyond propaganda and deceptive reading, we are voting (for) a regional budget that spent €965 million over the past three years in the fight against air pollution, smog, which is a determining factor in climate change," he said in a statement to CNN. "To say that we do nothing is a lie."</p><p>Ciambetti did acknowledge the flooding, and posted videos of it on his Facebook page.</p><p>"Never had such a situation occurred here (at the Council)," he told local paper Giornale di Vicenza, according to CNN.</p>
<div class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="50b119a7f2dca31f2a00613b157d2b01"><div class="fb-post" data-href="https://www.facebook.com/roberto.ciambetti/posts/10218056409594647"></div></div>
<p>The Italian government declared a state of emergency Thursday to help Venice recover, <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/11/14/779479948/following-days-of-destructive-floods-italy-declares-a-state-of-emergency-in-veni?t=1573812918944" target="_blank">NPR reported</a>.</p><p>The flooding has also continued after Tuesday, though at lower levels. On Thursday, the high water mark came to three feet, eight inches, and rain is expected to bring more flooding to the city.</p><p>"It hurts to see the city so damaged, its artistic heritage compromised, its commercial activities on its knees," Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte <a href="https://www.facebook.com/383458618802776/posts/761739814307986" target="_blank">said</a>, according to NPR.<br></p><p>Flooding damaged almost a third of the city's raised walkways, destroyed hundreds of books in the Acqua Alta Library and filled the crypt of St. Mark's Basilica, causing major damage. The Teatro La Fenice opera house was also damaged, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/nov/13/an-apocalypse-happened-venice-counts-cost-of-devastating-floods" target="_blank">The Guardian reported</a>.</p>
<iframe width="100%" height="150" scrolling="no" class="rm-shortcode twitter-embed-1194891139746320389" id="twitter-embed-1194891139746320389" lazy-loadable="true" src="/res/community/twitter_embed/?iframe_id=twitter-embed-1194891139746320389&created_ts=1573719222.0&screen_name=bibliomarciana&text=%23AquaAltaVenezia+Ecco+la+situazione+marciana+dopo+l%27eccezionale+marea+del+12+novembre+scorso.+Venticinque+cm+d%27acqu%E2%80%A6+https%3A%2F%2Ft.co%2FAVvQJzBDoQ&id=1194891139746320389&name=Biblioteca+Marciana" frameborder="0" data-rm-shortcode-id="0OZEUO1576661137"></iframe>
<p>"An apocalypse happened," Antonella Rossi, who owns a handmade jewelry store on St. Mark's Square, told The Guardian. "We haven't seen anything like this in 55 years. The water has destroyed everything, and I will have to redo so much – work that took a lifetime was wrecked in seconds."</p><p><a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-50416306" target="_blank">BBC News</a> meteorologist Nikki Berry explained how the climate crisis contributed to the historic flooding. While it is difficult to attribute any one <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/extreme-weather" target="_self">extreme weather</a> event to climate change, five of Venice's 10 highest tides took place in the last 20 years. Since Venice is sinking, it is especially susceptible to <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/sea-level-rise" target="_self">sea level rise</a>.</p><p>The storm surge that contributed to the flooding also shows the fingerprints of climate change, Berry explained:</p><blockquote>The weather patterns that have caused the Adriatic storm surge have been driven by a strong meridional (waving) jet stream across the northern hemisphere and this has fed a conveyor belt of low pressure systems into the central Mediterranean.<br><br>One of the possible effects of a changing climate is that the jet stream will be more frequently meridional and blocked weather patterns such as these will also become more frequent. If this happens, there is a greater likelihood that these events will combine with astronomical spring tides and hence increase the chance of flooding in Venice.</blockquote><p>Conte said the government would work to "accelerate" construction on the long-delayed Mose project, designed to protect Venice from flooding using a series of barriers, according to BBC News.</p>
<p><br/></p>From Your Site Articles
- These Iconic Mediterranean Landmarks are Currently at Risk from ... ›
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EcoWatch Daily Newsletter
Tourists wade through a flooded Piazza San Marco in Venice Monday. MIGUEL MEDINA / AFP / Getty Images
The worst flooding in at least a decade swamped Venice Monday as an exceptionally high tide covered around 70 percent of the iconic island city, the Huffington Post reported.
Venice is the Mediterranean World Heritage Site currently most at risk from flooding due to sea level rise, according to a recent study, and the city even has elevated sidewalks ready in case of high tides, but Monday's waters rose higher than the emergency sidewalks.
<p>The tide surpassed 5 feet, 3 inches, making it the highest recorded since 2008 and potentially the highest recorded since 1979, <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2018/10/30/europe/venice-flooding-intl/index.html" target="_blank">CNN reported</a>.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
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</p><p>The high water didn't stop tourists from wading around famous landmarks like Piazza San Marco as business owners worked to keep water from entering their shops. Videos posted to social media showed waiters serving pizza in rubber boots, waves crashing against historic buildings and a jellyfish swimming up a cobblestone street.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
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</p><p>Runners in the <a href="https://www.huaweivenicemarathon.it/en/venicemarathon/news-vm-eng/read/989-cs-winners-vm" target="_blank">Venice Marathon</a> competed Sunday despite 'the worst conditions ever for the event."<br></p><p>The flooding in Venice is immediately caused by a low-pressure system that has also brought flooding, wind and rain to other parts of northern Italy. At least six people have died, and popular Roman tourist sites like the Colosseum and Roman Forum were closed, the Huffington Post reported.</p><p>Venice, however, is increasingly used to flooding because of a combination of incoming silt, <a href="https://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-change" target="_self">climate change</a> and <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/methane" target="_blank">methane</a> gas drilling in the sea nearby that undermines its islands, <a href="https://abcnews.go.com/International/venice-experiencing-worst-flooding-2012/story?id=58828272&cid=social_twitter_abcn" target="_blank">ABC News reported</a>. When tide levels lower to 110 centimeters (approximately 3.6 feet) on Tuesday, they will be at levels Venice sees about four times a year, CNN said.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-twitter_embed">
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</p><p>Venice has been working on an ambitious series of flood barriers since 2003 dubbed "Project Moses." The project features retractable gates that would block the entrance to the city's lagoon when tides are high, but corruption scandals and high costs have beset the operation, which should be completed in 2022 and has already cost around $6.5 billion, the Huffington Post reported.<br></p><p>But an article published in <a href="https://e360.yale.edu/features/rising-waters-can-a-massive-sea-barrier-save-venice-from-drowning" target="_blank">YaleEnvironment360</a> last year pointed out that the barrier, which was first conceived after a record-breaking 1966 flood, was only designed to withstand 1 foot of sea level rise, and some scientists think we could see 2 feet by 2050. </p><p>"After that, the sea will come in from other places to the north and the south. There is nothing we can do to stop it," project spokesperson Monica Ambrosini said.</p>
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Lorenzo Quinn
A vital message has risen up from the Grand Canal in Venice. Two, 5,000 pound hands appear to be gripping the walls of the historic Ca' Sagredo Hotel echoing the warning of experts that say "The Floating City" could sink in as little as 100 years.
<p>Internationally renowned Italian artist Lorenzo Quinn <a href="https://www.halcyongallery.com/exhibitions/lorenzo-quinn-at-the-venice-biennale" target="_blank">unveiled</a> his new sculpture, <em>Support</em>, to serve as a call to "protect our planet" and "our national heritage sites." </p><p>"Venice is a floating art city that has inspired cultures for centuries, but to continue to do so it needs the support of our generation and future ones, because it is threatened by <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/">climate change</a> and time decay," Quinn said.<br></p><p>Experts say Venice and much of Italy's Adriatic coastline is at risk of disappearing from <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/sea-level-rise">sea level rise</a>. According to scientists from Italy and France, the Mediterranean will rise by up to five feet (140cm) before 2100, putting Venice and many other areas at risk.</p><p>The sculpture is in the shape of two childlike hands, modeled after his son's hands. Quinn hopes his installation will "speak to the people in a clear, simple and direct way through the innocent hands of a child" and send a powerful message that "united we can make a stand to curb climate change."</p><p>Quinn explained that he used hands to "symbolize tools that can both destroy the world, but also have the capacity to save it." The hands appear to be holding up the building, which draws attention to the fragile nature of the infrastructure and the impact climate change can have on the city.</p><p><em>Support</em> was unveiled on May 13 and will be on view until Nov. 26.</p><div id="b8d10" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="VVWYQ41495044324"><blockquote class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-version="4" style=" background:#FFF; border:0;
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<a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/BUHT8oPFeSu/" style=" color:#000; font-family:Arial,sans-serif;
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word-wrap:break-word;" target="_top">Instagram post by Lorenzo Quinn • May 15, 2017 at 1:13pm UTC</a></p>
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