Who will once more pay the disasters of Venice?

Billions of Euro spent in these years to secure the lagoon but nothing has changed

Rome (NEV / Riforma.it) November 16, 2019 – Alberto Bragaglia, RAI journalist and member of the Methodist and Waldensian Church of Venice, whom the NEV agency consulted on November 13 morning,  following the tragic news coming from the Venetian capital submerged by water, sent us these considerations :
“A completely exceptional high water: the 187 centimeters on the medium sea reached just before 11.00 pm on November 12th are the second highest level, after the disastrous one of November 4th 1966. A natural phenomenon, that of the tide, which becomes dramatic in particular periods of the year, but above all in the presence of particular climatic conditions. Conditions that have been occurring more and more often in recent years, if it is true that at about the same time (between October 30 and November 2) last year the tidal peak reached 156 centimeters, another record level.
The numbers don’t say much. They become more concrete when calculating how much of the historic city and the islands of the lagoon ends up under water: on the night of November 12th it was just over 80 percent, that is almost the whole city.
A night of anxiety, sleepless for many: a victim on the island of Pellestrina, struck by a short-circuit while the tide rose; another person hit by a fatal stroke. But above all, the individual and collective drama of houses and activities swallowed up by water, destroying lives, premises and years of hard work. The drama of the sailors of public boats, tossed about by the waves and the wind that blew with gusts over 100 km per hour; the tragedy of those who, coming out to bring relief, found themselves in difficulty and were in turn forced to call for help.
The social media, now ubiquitous, record and testify fears, anxieties, and once again draw the attention to the great ghost that has been hovering over the city for years: the MO.S.E. (Experimental Electromechanical Module). After the 1966 great flood, the urge to defend the very fragile and enchanted Venice was very strong. The great work started sixteen years ago was  to represent the realization of this defense, a rather bold project – starting from the acronym that indicates a system never tried before. Sixteen years after the laying of the first stone and almost six billion Euro already spent, the work is still not complete. For the moment it is not known when it will really come into operation: delivery, is now at least five years late. Not to mention that, when it will eventually become operational, for the designers themselves, there is the risk it could be already outdated: in fact, since the beginning it was said that the system would not contain tides with a peak higher than 160 centimeters.
But in the meantime, many residents would like to see it at least in operation. This is why the most frequent question between calluses and social networks is always the same: what for was all the money spent? Who will pay, once again, the damage of an event that climate change is making ever more extreme? What will the future of Venice be?”