Column: L'Aquila 10 years later

April 6, 2009. To say I still remember it as if it were yesterday would be a cliché, but it's not much. The shock that struck the city of L'Aquila at 3.32 am also immediately raised the alarm in Rome.

earthquakes with the epicenter about a hundred kilometers away, you can feel very well, especially if you live five high like us. At that in Umbria from 1997 my computer was dancing on the desk and at Amateur in October 2016 I was almost thrown out of my chair.

Italy after the October 2016 earthquakes:

Lampedusa

But 10 years ago I didn't notice anything – my wife did: she ran out of the house at the same time as the neighbors – for the simple reason that I was just at Lampedusa, where I worked on a TV program by Paul Rosenmöller about 'cross borders from Europe'.

An extremely frustrating situation for a journalist: as the scale of the disaster gradually became clear via the radio and the web and reporters from all over the world rushed to L'Aquila, I had to get off that island forsaken God and the world. And I can assure you: you are more likely to come to L'Aquila from New York than from Lampedusa!

But in the end, after the afternoon flight to Palermo, the last flight to Rome, a short night and a trip by car to the earthquake area, I was still in time in the early morning of April 7 to watch the RNW (you still had it then) to serve.

The L'Aquila earthquake and aftershocks over time:

I will never forget the condition I found. Whole families, pale and anxious, had spent the night outside or in the car – later I would speak to people who had slept in the car for more than a month for fear of new shocks.

Collapsed ancient monuments, cracked flats that didn't look so serious from the outside but turned out to be completely collapsed inside, open living rooms with no sidewalls, piles of rubble and dust, smashed cars, ghostly deserted streets with broken windows and alarm systems that screamed for days. .

Crying women and grim-looking men in front of the Casa dello Studente where eight young people died and where frenetic rubble was still being cleared in the vain hope of finding the living.

L'Aquila, the day after the earthquake:

earthquake hazard

The reason this building could collapse as a failed soufflé was because the earthquake hazard had not been taken into account during a recent renovation, according to the judge who sentenced the responsible architects and contractor to several years in prison.

That must have happened before, because how else can it be explained that an earthquake of 5,9 on the Richter scale could wreak such havoc not only on old but also brand new homes?

In Japan, the earth regularly shakes even more vigorously without such damage, but earthquake-proof construction is also underway there. Indeed, the master builders did not show their best side in L'Aquila. The remark of a construction baron (suspected of fraud and therefore overheard) became legendary, who, according to himself, was 'laughing in bed' after the earthquake. 309 dead but money doesn't stink!

Reminder

I then spent a week in L'Aquila, for newspaper articles, a report by Brandpunt and radio reports. One of these I remember well: during the live broadcast, the area was hit by a heavy aftershock that felt, as I said at the time, 'if the soil is liquefying'.

Those were days of regular visits to the Guardia di Finanza barracks just outside the city, from where emergency aid was coordinated and where regular press conferences were held with ever-increasing numbers of casualties.

Driving and lugging past abandoned farms, collapsed barns and broken roads we also arrived in Tornimparte, where the pastor celebrated mass in an army tent, in Onna, which is still one ruin, and in Lucoli, where Prime Minister Balkenende later visited because there a Dutch resident.

Civil protection

Of course we also visited the camps where a large part of the approximately 65.000 homeless were housed and where I once again saw my admiration for the Protezione Civile confirmed. This disaster management department is one of the few Italian administrative bodies that works well and quickly.

In the event of a flood, earthquake or avalanche, hundreds of the most experienced volunteers are called in to receive paid leave and can start work immediately. Within a few days, makeshift settlements of large blue tents with the most necessary facilities and soup kitchens where cooking was not bad at all arose all over the disaster area.

The offer of emergency aid by other European states was therefore actually superfluous. But when the emergency phase was over, and the residents could really use some help with the reconstruction, the L'Aquila earthquake was old news again and the initial generosity decreased correspondingly.

Although Russia, Canada, France, Kazakhstan and Germany came in with donations of 2 to 4 million euros each (the Netherlands with € 25.000), that is of course not much for an estimated damage of 18 billion.

It's going slow

Since then I have been regularly in L'Aquila, where a jungle of cranes has been at work for years. The municipal administration, university and the main industries were almost immediately placed in emergency housing, wooden emergency houses were furnished in the mountain villages and 18.000 homeless people ended up in so-called new towns, revolutionary building where the then prime minister Berlusconi made good appearances, but which is now due for renewal.

The old center, which is still largely under construction, is now also being tackled bit by bit, so that there are already a lot of food and drink options. But it's going slow, and that was to be expected.

The work on the old center of L'Aquila in pictures:

For example, I was recently in Nocera Umbra, a town that suffered badly from the earthquake of 1997 and has just been restored to a pristine condition, but that took 20 years. If you consider that Nocera has less than 6.000 inhabitants compared to L'Aquila's 70.000, so it may take a while before the city's recovery is complete, with all bureaucratic slowness, corruption and political games that accompany these kinds of processes in Italy.

There is therefore still a danger that it will all come too late and L'Aquila will become a dead city. Help prevent that and therefore come to beautiful Abruzzo and visit L'Aquila!