The Vajont Dam and the tourism of memory

Active Slow Tour

30 August 2018

Active Slow Tour

The Vajont Dam and the tourism of memory

Walking along the top of the Vajont Dam is rather hair-raising, not only for its height, 264 metres, which gave it the world record in 1959 when it was completed, but above all because the dam is a monument to memory. The scenario is that of Valle del Vajont, on the border between the Veneto and Friuli Venezia Giulia. The protagonists are the Monte Toc and the Vajont Torrent, one of the streams that was supposed to feed the reservoir and contribute to its operation. “Supposed to” because we already know how it ended. The concerns of the local inhabitants had remained unheard and the Sade construction company had continued the completion of the works and the subsequent filling of the reservoir, regardless of the warning signs and the impending danger. Until the fateful evening of 9 October 1963, when a gigantic landslide slid down the flank of Monte Toc. The impact of the landslide on the reservoir raised a wave more than 70 metres high, which swept away the hamlet of Erto and brushed past the village of Casso, before rising over the dam and crashing down on the town of Longarone beneath, killing almost 2000 people. Despite the huge landslide, the violence of the water and the immense displacement of air, the dam remained almost intact. Apart from the area where the control room was located, overwhelmed and completely swept away, for over 50 years this work of great hydraulic engineering is still splendid with its double arched shape. It is in a fantastic position, overlooking the river Piave and the small town of Longarone. The Vajont Dam has become a place to visit, open to the public for the past 20 years and currently managed by the Friulian Dolomites Park Authority; it boasts over 100,000 annual visitors. There are two routes to follow: a short 40-minute visit and a longer 3-hour visit. For both, as guides there are the “informers of memory”, the volunteers who tell of the valley’s history, its community and the project for a dam that has made the site so sadly famous. From the village of Casso the view is wider and from there you can see what remains of Monte Toc and get an idea of ??the magnitude of the catastrophe. It is also worth stopping at the Visitor Centres of Erto and Casso and that of Longarone, with important collections of photographs of the time and finds recovered after the disaster.

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Esmeralda Perosa

I'm a slow tourist, with a backpack and map at my fingertips. I love cinema and old movies. I collect photos and extraordinary stories of ordinary people. Friuli is a mix of plain, sea and mountain, where special places are just around the corner.