“Learn from the lessons of the past.” I heard this phrase yesterday on SIC, and I couldn’t help but think how wrong it is to use it when we are going through some of the most difficult winter days in recent years.
The images shown to us by television cameras or published photos illustrate areas of the country practically submerged, roads impassable, dams forced to release and people being forced to leave their homes, whether due to lack of habitable conditions or as a precaution. And it’s good to remember, more than two weeks after the depression passed Kristin – which followed Leonardo, the Marta ea Nils in a few days – there are still areas only accessible via boats that the Armed Forces provide.
I think it is unanimous that given the strength of the first depression that hit the country, in the early hours of January 28th, with a lot of rain and winds exceeding 150 kilometers/hour, little could be done immediately, other than helping those who were affected.
But the question that leads us to the sentence at the beginning of the text is the learning that was not done.
Let’s take the example of Coimbra: flooded fields, the Mondego exceeding its banks, the Aguieira Dam trying to retain as much water as possible and, at the time of writing, there are many fears that some dikes will not be able to withstand the pressure and will burst, causing a greater rise in the water level.
And is this situation new? Is this the first time the city has faced it? The answer is NO. In 2001, extreme rains, discharges from Aguieira and the collapse of dikes caused the Baixo Mondego to be submerged and countless families displaced.
In 2008, the construction of the Girabolhos Dam was announced, in Seia, announced as essential to help manage the effect of rain and protect Coimbra. A project blocked in 2016 by decision of the Government led by António Costa, and which gained momentum on the 4th when the Minister of Environment and Energy, Maria da Graça Carvalho, announced that the tender for the construction of the infrastructure will be launched by the end of March.
So, a new promise. As has always happened in Portugal when there are extreme situations: it was like this with the fires in 2017 and little change in behavior was seen, both from people and from the State; It happened in 2001 and now it has happened again. We should therefore learn to plan, to choose prevention instead of reaction and to have quick responses. For example: taking the warnings from the Institute of the Sea and Atmosphere seriously, which in these weeks could have helped to mitigate some effects so that we could try not to have people still isolated or without electricity more than two weeks after their passage.
Executive editor of News Diary
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