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In the space of a minute and a half, small and very small municipalities, a true Italian heritage, were pulverized: a human tragedy huge marked by almost nine thousand wounded (8,848) and 300 thousand homeless. Beyond the numbers, the earthquake left Campania and Basilicata in torment and spread its wave to nearby Molise and Puglia, to the Po Valley in the north and Sicily in the south. Forty years later, the memory of that day and the weeks that followed, characterized by a Powerless in the face of disaster, unable to coordinate i rescue, late and insufficient despite it immense effort sent by volunteers, is far from fading.
The testimony: “The building was moving, I hugged my husband and my son tightly” – We often speak of the strength of testimonies. But how is it measured? It’s a matter of your pulse: the faster you accelerate, the more powerful the story and you have to tell it. “Just remembering it, I shudder.” I had never heard of the woman, now 86, who had gotten used to much more soothing and sweet tones. Because, yes, the woman in question is the writer’s grandmother: Professor Magda Del Secolo, born and raised in Melfi (Potenza), a town that fully experienced the destructive force of the earthquake. I was very afraid not to do it, on the night of that November 23: “The scene I will never forget was the hug with your grandfather and little Joshua, leaning against the column between the bedroom and the dining room. We were shaking with fear. movements of the building that, according to the people who were in the square, leaned forward and swayed fearfully. It was the first time that I felt the resignation of having to die “.
The tragedy of Balvano – Symbol of what, for those who live in that part of Italy, is still today simply “the earthquake of the 80s” is still the collapse of the roof of the Main Church of Balvano (Potenza) that buried 66 people, mostly children and children. That day a whole generation disappeared from the country. Some municipalities close to the epicenter, including Sant’Angelo dei Lombardi, Lioni, Conza della Campania, Castelnuovo di Conza, Santomenna, Laviano, Muro Lucano, were almost razed, others seriously damaged.
Infinite reconstruction – Today in those territories the reconstruction is almost finished, but the fortieth anniversary still brings back dramatic memories. Not only because of the pain and the ruins, but also because of the complaints that in the days after the earthquake continued to rise from the rubble due to the delays in the rescue, which the then President of the Republic Sandro Pertini denounced in a loud and firm voice. And again, due to the exasperating slowness that accompanied the process of rebuilding the houses, while the lament of the evacuees continued to echo, they camped gradually, with the bitter cold and snow, first in the tents and railroad cars, then in the caravans, then containers, until a prefab home looked like a real home, albeit a precarious one. And, finally, for the theft of so many jackals, sculpted in dozens of judicial investigations, which have reached the enormous resources allocated by the State – more than 50 thousand billion lire, resulting in the final report presented in 1991 by the Parliamentary Commission. of Survey, chaired by Oscar Luigi Scalfaro – minimizing, in particular, the future of industrial development that had been designed for those areas.
Civil Protection is born – Immediately after the earthquake, in the face of images of despair, precariousness and need that televisions spread throughout the world, the rescue machine was finally put into operation, led by Giuseppe Zamberletti, appointed extraordinary commissioner of the government. It was the premise of a modern Civil Protection structure, which the country has today, in which the state, the regions and the local authorities are called to create a system.
Development, not development – In May 1981 something seems to be moving also for the remodeling and industrial development of the areas where the 506 damaged municipalities of the provinces of Avellino, Benevento, Caserta, Matera, Foggia, Naples, Potenza and Salerno are located. However, despite the enactment of Law 219, only very few companies are in business, many companies have declared bankruptcy some time after receiving government subsidies. Almost half of the industrial concessions were gradually revoked and only a small part of the financial resources were recovered. Finally, the University of Basilicata was born on the rubble of the 1980 earthquake, conceived as a model of excellence for the entire south, but which also aims to stop, or at least stop, the emigration of young people from the south to other areas of the country and from abroad.
A bitter poem about Naples – Perhaps more than data, statistics and reports, it is the verses that return that mixture of despair and an almost angry conscience, of disorientation and denunciation of who, from then on, will acquire the fame of “victim of the earthquake”. “We die with flour / like clowns in an equestrian circus / plus a trickle of blood from our mouths. / We all had in mind / a name we love and in vain, / for now, something made us forget”. The writer Domenico Rea thus remembers in poetry his Naples struck by the earthquake A story from the south. The ending reveals more than any article, study or history book: “Then there was the event, a deep black rage / between the stroke and the heart attack, a doubt, / like the weight of a crazy scale I heard Pertini’s footsteps and the plush steps of the Pope, / but neither, human creatures, / had nails to nail us.
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