City of water
High tide inside the Gritti Palace
on Nov. 12, as Venice was beset by
6-ft.-high floods, the deepest in half a
century. The waters also rose to about
5 ft. on Nov. 15 and 17, swamping
cultural sites and causing hundreds
of millions of dollars in damage. The
city faces a compounded threat: its
foundations are sinking into the mud,
even as sea levels rise because of
climate change. An underwater barrier
system, meant to hold back the sea and
intended to be operational by 2011,
remains unfinished.
Photograph by Marco Bertorello—
AFP/Getty Images
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