AGAIN

Most of you will have read or seen by now that there has been another strong earthquake in Northern Italy, just eight days after the 6.0 quake that terrorised the people of the Province of Modena and displaced thousands, many of whom are being accommodated in tents.  Imagine their fear, then, when a 5.8 quake struck at 9 am today.

The epicentre this time was between Carpi, Medolla and Mirandola, still in the Province of Modena and the quake was felt in parts of  Lombardy, Trentino, Tuscany and even Austria. At 12.56 there was a further, 5.3 quake.

As I write 16 people are reported dead, one person is missing, at least 350 have been injured and 8,000 people are estimated to have been made homeless. The brings the total number of people made homeless by the earthquakes of 20th May and today to a staggering 14,000.  Premier Monti has promised that everything possible will be done to help them.

In such circumstances we must take comfort where we can and at 21.00, exactly twelve hours after this morning's quake, a 60-year-old woman was pulled out of the rubble injured but alive.  The headboard of her bed had protected her as her home collapsed around her.

The University of Bologna, together with the city's schools, will be closed tomorrow whilst safety checks are carried out.  In the city of Modena, where some public buildings have been slightly damaged, schools, cemeteries, museums, swimming pools and theatres will be closed.  I have spent some time in Modena so was sorry to learn that some of the buildings in its lovely historic centre may also have been damaged.

Italians pull together magnificently at times like these and modern technology has also played its part:  when mobile networks in the earthquake-hit area became overloaded this morning, messages asking people to remove their passwords from their wifi systems to enable the rescue services to find people and communicate with each other more efficiently quickly circulated on twitter.  Also on twitter, the singer Laura Pausini urged people in the area whose houses were intact to open up their homes to less fortunate citizens.  If I know Italians, they did not need to be told to do that.

Monday 4th June is to be a national day of mourning in Italy.