The town of Niscemi, in the province of Caltanissetta (Sicily), was affected by a new landslide which caused an estimated subsidence of approximately 6 metres, forcing over 500 residents to evacuate as a precaution. The landslide event, probably caused by the heavy rains of the last few days, occurred around 1pm yesterday, Sunday 25 January, in the stretch connecting the Provincial Road SP 10 and the town centre, near the Sante Croci neighbourhood.
The mayor of the town, Massimiliano Conti, spoke of a “dramatic landslide event”, which occurred in an area that had already suffered a landslide 29 years ago, with the consequent disappearance of an entire neighborhood. The displaced people were welcomed during the night at the “Pio La Torre” sports hall, while the authorities ordered the closure of all schools.
Now Niscemi, which has around 25,000 inhabitants, is at risk of isolation: in recent days provincial road 12 had been closed due to the damage caused by Cyclone Harry; after the landslide, the authorities also ordered the closure of SP 10. At the moment, the only exit road from the country remains Provincial Road 11, already known to the local population for its danger and which now risks an overload of traffic.
The event adds to the previous landslide which occurred on 16 January 2026, which had already compromised the connections between Niscemi, Gela, Catania and Caltanissetta, with heavy repercussions on the resident population.
The Fire Brigade immediately intervened on the site, as did the technicians of the Regional Department of Civil Protection, who are carrying out geological surveys to “verify any correlation between the ongoing landslide phenomenon and the one that occurred last January 16th”.
From a geological point of view, it was a sliding landslide: this type of landslide is favored by the presence of rock layers with different characteristics (for example rock resting on a plastic clay material), separated by planes oriented in the same direction as the slope, with an inclination equal to or lower than that of the slope. These slides are facilitated by the infiltration of water between the layers and by the erosive action of any water courses at the foot of the slope: the mass that detaches can remain relatively intact or disintegrate into blocks.
