Deaf American tourist’s account of Venice floods

[Transcript] On Wednesday I reported that there were severe flooding in Venice, Italy from a 6 feet, 2 inches tide that caused widespread damage. A Deaf American tourist, Brandon Henry, was there and experienced the floods firsthand. He sent videos to describe it.

BRANDON HENRY:

Hey, I’m Brandon Henry. I’m here in Venice, Italy. I’ve been traveling for about a month and a half now. I thought it was time to visit Venice and hoped to meet some deaf people here, but unfortunately, I did not. I had arrived the night before the incident. I had spent the night and got up in the morning ready to explore Venice. When I went outside, I saw that there was flooding. People were wearing their rain boots, raincoats and protective coverings for their shoes. Even though this was surprising to me, I didn’t take it that seriously until I arrived at a bridge I wanted to across. The bridge was covered by the floodwater. I ended up having to buy something to cover up my shoes. There was one place I had really wanted to visit: the St. Mark’s Square. As I got closer, it became apparent that I wasn’t going to be able to get in. The flooding was so deep that I would’ve had to swim to get there. It took me awhile to consider it because I really wanted to go, but I eventually gave up on the idea. On my way back, I saw a lot of property damage and stores closing, but some of them were still in operation. Some people didn’t pay much mind to walking in the water while some of the stores were under duress, trying to pump water out of their stores. About half of them were affected by this while the other half weren’t. As I walked further, I saw even more damage and then I arrived at my hotel room to check the news. It was then I finally understood that an actual emergency had been declared. I was like, “Oh, no wonder!”

It was incredible spending my day seeing all these damages and seeing some stores reacting differently to this crisis. What a wild experience that was for me! But Venice is still a beautiful city! It’s still a must-visit!

Thank you, Brandon for sharing.

NPR reported that Venice has declared a state of emergency and that the Italian Prime Minister Conte and his administration has approved an emergency fund of 20 million euros.

Venice does experience flooding often, but not at this scale. The mayor of Venice said it was because of climate change. There is a large project called MOSE to build some kind of barrier against flooding, but it has been delayed and is expected to be completed in 2021.

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