Introduction
I started to write this post one year ago but, due to the content of the story, I decided several times to postpone the publication.
Being at the time a three and a half year old child, I wasn’t able to understand what was going on, but I will never forget the Police sirens that, for hours, were passing near my house
Longarone
It is not a special place, Longarone. Most of the huge amount of tourist that are passing in there, to reach, in every season, Dolomite mountains, simply remember this town because it is the first one that they reach, when they left the highway. Longarone seems to be a new town, built on the late ‘60, with a huge amount of visible reinforced concrete, completely different form a classic mountain’s village.
Longarone is known for the Ice cream and because in the area they produce most of the glasses used in the world.
Most of the tourists hardly notice the huge dam, that they can see for a few seconds while waiting at the traffic light, in the center of the town.
Vajont is the name of a dam. When the dam has been built, on 1960, it was the highest in the world, 261 meters height. Now, 59 years later, it is the seventh highest dam.
Vajont is a creek, a small creek, that born on the top of Vajont valley
Vajont is a narrow and deep valley, excavated in thousand of year by the creek
Vajont is a so powerful word that, if pronounced it in a party, can transform immediately happiness into sadness, chatter into silence, smiles changing to thoughtful faces
Wants to know more? At the traffic light, turn right, an take a few hours to explore a piece of history of my country
The aim of this post is to discover, and give new life, to places that, after the tragedy of October 9, 1963, has been abandoned. Reading the story, you will understand how the ambitions of the people can sometime lead to something completely different to what they wanted to obtain.
Visiting the place, you will physically learn the story of at least three places:
Vajont Dam, the story of how and why the dam was built, and the story of the mountain that fallen down, filling completely the lake, and destroying the town of Longarone
Erto, the town on the valley, upstream the dam
Casso, the town over the mountain, right above the dam
The Dam.
The dam was built in three years, from 1957 to 1960 and it was, at the time, the highest dam in the world, with a height of 261 meters. The idea was to built a masterpiece of Italian engineering, something to be proud of, to show to the world, 15 years after the end of World War II. It was, it still be a masterpiece. The view, from the top of the Dam, is impressive.You have the valley just below you and, on the background, the town of Longarone
From Longarone’s traffic light you can reach the place in 15 minutes by car.
You can park on the right side, just near the dam, in a small parking area for visitors, or 500 meters ahead, in a larger parking space. Now, before you go, I need to tell you what you will find, and the meaning of what you will see. If you look on your left side you will see, over the mountain, a small town. The name of the town is Casso. Keep this town in your mind, please
Casso, a beautiful, typical alpine town, built over a cliff, watching the lake.
Yes, the lake. If there is a dam, we should have a lake in there.
So, look at the lake. This is the view of the lake, how the lake was, on 1962, when they filled the dam
The lake is no longer there. No water, only soil and stones. There is a mountain, instead of the lake.
Well, it is not so simple to explain. The scale is so large that you need to move back, far from the dam, to understand what happened in there. There is a perfect point of view, the small town over the cliff, Casso. You can reach the town in five minutes by car. Everything is quite and silent. From there, you have finally the right size, just in front of you.
A big piece a naked rocks, shaped like a M, still present visible after 56 year. The mountain fallen down, filling completely the lake, in a few minutes. 270 millions of cubic meters of mountain, at the speed of 110 Km/h, was taking the place of 150 millions of cubic meters of water.
The water made a jump of more that 250 meters, reaching Casso (do you remember the town over the dam?) and Erto, 2.5 Km behind the dam.
30 millions of cubic meters of water jumped over the dam, 262 meters of eight, so the total eight of the wave was 512 meters. 330 million cubic meters of water that, after a jump of 512 meters, enter the valley you see in the picture below in just a few seconds
The water compressed the air. The air that had only a way to escape and, as you can see in the photo, only a target to reach: Longarone. The energy estimated of the shock wave is double of the one generated by the Hiroshima bomb.
This explain the sirens of the police that, 100 Km downstream, was reaching the river, to pick up bodies.
The area was abandoned for 50 years, too much bad memories for many of the survivors, and it is now slowly returning to life.
So, if you are going to Dolomite Mountains, and you choose to visit the place, turn right on the traffic light. In a few minutes you will reach the dam, and from there, you can quickly be on both the ghost town.
You will see a piece of history, that a few are trying to keep alive. On Saturday and Sunday there is also a guided tour, that I suggest you to take. All the rest is free and, going there, you will help the life to restart, together with the few that wanted to remain.
If you want to have a preview, there is a street view over the dam, made by Google: https://goo.gl/maps/7hSHy7bGyURrPJHw9
During the visit You can also see the old photos of the construction site, on 1960
And of course, you can visit the two ghost town. Here a preview
Erto
Casso
This is a collaborative post by #TeamItaly included in the #TeamChallenge proposed by @ermest. The post is part of the series about Italy: Italian culture between ancient and modern
Grazie mille
