ReportingAfter the deadly events of July in Wallonia, the victims remain marked by the extent of the damage.
There are the figures which, two months later, still make you dizzy: 38 dead and one missing, some 224,000 buildings affected or destroyed, 2,600 businesses in difficulty, 12,000 vehicles suitable for scrapping, 155,000 tonnes of waste collected, etc. And then there are the countless tales of human tragedies, big and small. Including that of Giulio Gobatto, who recounts with calm and spite the terrible days of July 14 and 15.
This former Sicilian-born trucker lives in Pepinster, one of the municipalities hardest hit by the torrential rains that swept in, causing damage in 209 of the 262 municipalities in Wallonia. The Vesdre and its tributary, the Hoëgne, overflowed. In front of Giulio Gobatto’s little house, the stream has reached 6 meters. He took everything, including the gas station, collapsed buildings, killed an old lady whose body was to be found in Trooz, 13 kilometers downstream. Five other victims were recorded in this municipality of 9,800 inhabitants. More than half of them have been affected by the floods, many have lost everything, around 40 houses will have to be demolished.
“My furniture, my beautiful kitchen, everything is gone, tells Giulio Gobatto. I had 1.5 meters of water in the entrance but the scariest part was the noise. Like that of a huge torrent. And then there were the smells, of oil, of gas, of rubbish. We had headaches for a long time ”, he explains with his rocky accent.
Further on, in the rue Neuve, the doors and windows of the Pot de Beurre are open and give a glimpse of a devastated room. Hervé Bogaert’s restaurant, which entered the Michelin Guide thanks to its “unmissable fowl with Burgundy wines”, will undoubtedly not reopen. Of the hundred or so businesses in the municipality, less than ten were able to get back on track. “We are automatons, our brain has stalled but that’s better, given the time it will take us to get out of all this”, says Vincent Gohy who tries, opposite, to restore his house. Another neighbor, Sullivan Plunus, mentions other difficulties. Like that of this client, the owner of a house that is still considered habitable and sufficiently stable, unlike all the others on the street. If he wants to leave it and demolish it, it will be at his expense, even if he has lost everything in it.
“People are a little desperate”
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