In Tuscany, flood relief came late.

I told her: '\'Run, it's a river'\' and we ran to the top. We were lit up by cell phone flashlights, water was everywhere," she says, still in shock.

The water rushed into the kitchen and spared nothing: the strong current turned the furniture, blocking also the front door. Standing at the window on the first floor of her house on Via Santa Maria in Campi Bisenzio, Peluso tried for hours to call for help, fearing that the water would rise to the second floor as well. "The water reached the second staircase, we opened the roof hatch, and with my husband and daughter we discussed that if the water was still rising we would try to climb up it. But thankfully that wasn't necessary. My husband was not able to do it," says the woman, who has been with about 30 people in the multipurpose hall since November 3''of the Spazio Reale convention center in San Donnino. "I called the 112 number, I called the 118 number. I was told I would be called back as the situation was supposed to be addressed throughout the region, but I'm still waiting. The batteries were dead, we were scared, freezing and left in the dark. My nephew had a fever and my husband was getting around with crutches," Peluso complained.

Nobody showed up until 2 a.m., except for two volunteers from Misericordia (a local volunteer-run health care service) who came by to take a look. "The home door was blocked by furniture, so we couldn't even go outside." The next morning her cousin, who lives in the province of Pisa, managed to contact the 118 service, which sent an ambulance''help. The team arrived on the scene and helped the family get out of the house destroyed by the Bisenzio River. "Volunteers opened the door by kicking it with sticks so we could get out," says the woman, who still cannot understand why the rescue services took so long and why a clearer warning about the risk faced by the population was not disseminated.

The evening of the day before, the husband received several messages on WhatsApp from the Campi Bisenzio Municipal Office. The warning had been given a few days earlier.