2023-09-30 15:04:55
by ALESSANDRO FULLONI
«Never again Vajont, 1963/2023» by Paolo di Stefano and Riccardo Iacona is published by Fuoriscena, sixty years after the tragedy. From 3 October in bookstores and on newsstands with the «Corriere»
There is the emotion, mixed with pride, of Indro Montanelli. That of Vajont «belongs to a genre of tragedies for which it is difficult, indeed impossible, to console oneself. However, there was something that encourages us to hope: and it is the enthusiasm with which the Italians responded to the subscription called by the “Corriere della Sera” in favor of the survivors”. There is Dino Buzzati who paints a famous image: «A stone fell into a glass full of water and the water overflowed onto the tablecloth. That’s all. Except that the glass was hundreds of meters high and the stone was as big as a mountain and underneath, on the tablecloth, there were thousands of human creatures who couldn’t defend themselves.”
There are the great correspondents of Italian journalism, including Giampaolo Pansa, Alberto Cavallari, Egisto Corradi. The first, for «la Stampa», thus attacks – with a memorable incipit – his first correspondence from those places in the Cadore area of Belluno which have become hell: «I am writing from a town that no longer exists: swept away in a few moments by a gigantic avalanche of ‘water, boulders and earth fallen from the dam’. The second, in the «Corriere», talks about the victims and says that «they are not buried alive. They are buried dead. A colonel stamps his feet on the gravel and says in the darkness: “We are walking on a layer of at least 1,500 dead, to say the least.” The third, who had just returned from Libya and had already been diverted to Vajont, again in the «Corriere» describes «the men and women, the old people and the children inside the houses sleeping or watching television, or playing cards in the cafés, who have no could have done nothing to defend themselves.” On the «Giorno» Giorgio Bocca says to the dimaphonists: «Here is the valley of misfortune in the morning twilight: mud, silence, solitude. And immediately understand that all this is definitive: nothing left to do or say.”
But there is also Tina Merlin, and part of this overwhelming book – Never again Vajont, 1963/2023, out October 3, published by Fuoriscena – revolves around what she wrote – or rather, better: predicted, but unheard – fierce reporter for «l’Unità». To give an idea of her work, here is a meticulous prophecy dated November 8, 1960, three years before the massacre. The “Cassandra del Vajont” – this is the nickname, between sarcasm and contempt, given to the former partisan Tina – wrote of the “artificial lake of Erto, into whose basin the waters have been released just a month ago” and for this reason “has already started to cause disasters. A huge landslide has fallen into the lake in recent days, detaching itself from the land on the left bank in the Toc area, just above the large Vajont dam. A plot of forest and meadow approximately 300 meters long succumbed to water erosion and fell into the lake. By pure chance there wasn’t any tragedy.” The one that, however, always triggered by a landslide, will occur later.
The book, composed of two essays signed respectively by Paolo Di Stefano, special correspondent of the «Corriere della Sera», and Riccardo Iacona, presenter of Presadiretta (Rai 3), recounts a massacre that constitutes «the most sensational of the quasi-photocopy events» that have marked our country. A story that still speaks to us – is the eloquent subtitle – and which connects the disaster to the many which, little by little, have devastated Italian soil with earthquakes, landslides and floods, including the latest one, the one in Romagna – where Iacona is remained for two weeks to collect testimonies – on the night between 16 and 17 May it caused 15 deaths. The story always remains in the news, brutal, light and distressing, thanks to those articles and those reports, cataloged together for the first time, which described the “Nagasaki of Italy”.
It is 10.39pm on 9 October 1963: a monstrous landslide, 270 million cubic meters of rock and earth, falls from Mount Toc into the Alpine basin formed by the Vajont dam, among the highest in the world: in falling into the reservoir, the landslide it raises a wave that goes over the dam and falls to the valley floor. Five towns were cancelled, including Longarone: 1,917 victims. Merlin arrives among the first and here is another famous incipit of his with a beating drum: «I am in Ponte nelle Alpi: the road is blocked by police officers, carabinieri, soldiers. You can not pass”. The eager Tina was a very good journalist, all her colleagues knew it, especially the big names who struggled even to mention her when it was necessary to recognize her flair and tenacity with which she reported the complaints of the local population against Sade – owner of the dam until Enel became one, with nationalization – and the unheard appeals to the State. Yes, Vajont was also «a macroscopic and resistant example of oblivion, obscuration or removal which has an evident sexist matrix». And we will have to wait for Sandro Viola, in the «Espresso», for the partisan reporter to finally be cited for her scrupulous investigations. The Cold War is the backdrop: from there «l’Unità» which, having anticipated everything about the risks of the dam, speaks of «genocide», from here Montanelli’s invective against «the ignoble, vile, disgusting and scoundrel political speculation of the PCI on the corpses.”
Then there is “fatality”. In the 223 pages this word appears often, 16 times. From the beginning – “as almost always happens, especially in Italy, after great collective tragedies”, observes Di Stefano – there was a division “between those who supported predictability and those who were on the side of natural fatality”. Buzzati, a mountain man from those places, was a fatalist, and in a comment entitled Cruel Nature repeated his point of view and exonerated the designers by writing about «a glass made to perfection». On the fortieth anniversary of the disaster, Bocca, in «Repubblica», joked about the remote editorial of the «Corriere» written by «a well-known writer from Belluno who knows nothing about the dam and the Vajont». Valid sarcasm for Bocca himself given that he too – recalls Di Stefano – wrote on the spot that «in atomic times, one could say that this is a “clean” disaster, men did not have their hands in it, everything was done by nature, neither good nor bad, but indifferent.” The book ends with an article signed by the correspondent of the «Corriere» Ettore Mo. It reports the words engraved on the family tomb of a certain Luigino who lost his wife and children “barbarously and cowardly slaughtered out of human thoughtlessness and greed”. Clearly visible, underneath it was written: «PREMEDITATED MASSACRE».
The «Corriere» rewarded for the help offered in 1963
Immediately after the Vajont catastrophe, the «Corriere della Sera», then directed by Alfio Russo, launched a popular subscription in favor of the populations affected by the disaster. Within about twenty days the fundraising exceeded one billion lire and allowed the daily newspaper in Via Solferino to actively contribute to the difficult relief and reconstruction work undertaken after the disaster. In memory of that solidarity, the Municipality of Longarone (Belluno), which was completely destroyed by the flood, presents the biennial prize “I Murazzi – in memory of Gianfranco Trevisan” to the director of the «Corriere» Luciano Fontana, on Saturday 30 September. The ceremony is scheduled for 12 pm in the council room of the Municipality of Longarone. Gianfranco Trevisan was Longarone’s doctor, who did his utmost in the rescue efforts and then died in 1966 due to a flood.
September 30, 2023 (modified September 30, 2023 | 3:10 pm)
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