The non-stop work of the more than 900 TIM technicians who reconnected, in the shortest time possible, the people and districts of Emilia-Romagna hit by the flood. But also the ordeal of real life submerged in water and mud to be rapidly restored, to reconnect to the flow of normal life and to start again, day by day, after an adverse, sudden and unpredictable natural event. These are the key themes of ‘Riconnessioni [Reconnections]’, the photo exhibition by Rosa Mariniello which TIM is presenting at Rimini’s exhibition centre during the 2023 Meeting for Friendship Among Peoples. More than one hundred photos of people and places, so as not to forget and to express the utmost solidarity with the inhabitants affected.
Stories of courage and tenacity in the frenzy of vehicles and people armed with buckets and spades, caked in mud from head to foot, to restore internet and phone connections, even more crucial when it comes to maintaining contact with loved ones in situations of extreme isolation. With more than 500 motor vehicles, 70 equipped vans and 20 vehicles with mobile transceiver stations and power plants with emergency electric power generators, TIM delivered relief to the areas hit by the flood. Where landslides had damaged fibre-optic cables, preventing access by emergency vehicles, the areas concerned had to be reached by helicopter. Meanwhile, radio links were activated in areas where mudslides had completely destroyed the cables.
Images from news reports transform into stationary reproductions of a petrified reality that becomes sculpture. Along the roadsides, countless objects like mountains of rubbish, be it toys, furniture, books, digital circuits that convey the virtual. In the fields, crops still partially inundated by water or suffocated by the deposited mud. Walls like canvasses on which to paint a new story, where awareness of environmental protection, necessary and vital, becomes the sole focus.
“Riconnessioni is above all the story of the human connections that helped people to resist and to react, but it is also the journey through everything that was destroyed and that had to be quickly repaired. Because our lives need connections for many reasons. To be close to those far away, to bring help where it is needed, to make our everyday lives easier, to access services quickly and safely. That's part of the reason that, with our technicians, the women and men of TIM, with the Group’s expertise and all available resources, we committed to supporting Emilia-Romagna to return to normality as quickly as possible”, stresses Maria Enrica Danese Head of Institutional Communication, Sustainability & Sponsorship at the TIM group.
“As soon as I arrived in Romagna, just after the first bout of bad weather, I was struck by the frenzy of the rescue in operation, the vehicles, the images reminiscent of the post-war period, by the dense and oppressive smells of the cities and fields inundated with water and mud, by the mountains of objects piled up like rubbish. All of this crystallized into images of such passion that not even the water could dampen, of a tragic reality that was nonetheless already reaching out to a return to normality, in a poetic transition enriched by the stories and smiles of the inhabitants of Romagna and the many people, like TIM’s technicians but also the volunteers, who rushed to provide aid and to show their solidarity.”, explains Rosa Mariniello, the architect and photographer who took the photos on exhibit at the Meeting for Friendship Among Peoples 2023.
CREDITS:
Photos: Rosa Mariniello for TIM
Rimini, 23 August 2023
