The grim job of searching for flood victims in Alpine villages and on the nearby French and Italian coasts has grown even more gruesome: Along with storm casualties, authorities say corpses from cemeteries have also been found around the Mediterranean shore, apparently swept down the mountain by violent rains.
A total of 12 deaths have been reported since the storm pounded France’s Alpes-Maritimes region and Italy’s northwestern regions of Liguria and Piedmont starting Friday – four on the French side, eight on the Italian side.
More than 600 rescuers and others were searching Tuesday for some 20 people still missing, according to a spokeswoman for the Alpes-Maritimes regional administration.
Corpses unearthed from cemeteries have washed up on the Italian side, she told The Associated Press. She could not say how many or where they came from, and it was unclear whether the bodies were among the eight reported dead in Italy from the storm. Italian local authorities could not immediately be reached for comment.
The cemetery corpses were in such an advanced state of decomposition that they were clearly distinguishable from recent storm victims, the French spokeswoman said.