by Kostas Zafeiropoulos, Konstantina Maltepioti \u2013 MIIR *<\/p>\n
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\u201cThe flood has changed our lives. My children are scared every time it rains. My son had a panic attack when the bridges in Faenza were closed recently, because he thought the same thing would happen. And I can\u2019t help but look at the river every time I drive by. I live from day to day now. Everything can change in an instant. You know, I lost everything in half an hour\u201d. Francesca Placci, 42, a cook, lives in the Italian city of Faenza, in the province of Ravenna, in Emilia-Romagna. Faenza<\/strong>, located 50 kilometres south-east of Bologna, was flooded three times in 18 months<\/strong> during the 2023-2024 biennium.<\/p>\n As in Thessaly and Valencia, the inhabitants of this Italian city are still living with fear and anxiety about the future after this triple shock.\u00a0 \u201cEvery time it rains, I am afraid. Our confidence is gone. We no longer know what we can rely on. This place is not safe.<\/strong> Nothing will ever be the same again. My husband is more tired now, more silent. In our community we continue to help each other, but the state has never been there for us. Instead, all we got was a mess of bureaucracy and crumbs of financial support. We have learned to rely only on ourselves and the people around us,\u201d says Simona Bacchilega, 54.<\/p>\n Her voice echoes and joins those of the inhabitants of Palamas Karditsa, Mandra, Volos and Pelion, the neighbourhoods of Valencia<\/strong> in Spain, the Danube regions of Hungary and Slovakia, in Baden-W\u00fcrttemberg, Bavaria and Saarland in Germany, in the provinces of Karlovac and Sisk-Moslavina in Croatia and in dozens of other affected areas.<\/p>\n