That early January afternoon the sky is clear, accompanied by an almost unnatural freezing wind at these latitudes. Cagliari finds itself enveloped in an intense cold, the sun seems distant and incapable of guaranteeing the usual certainties of winter in the Golfo degli Angeli. The cold increases even more after sunset, around eleven o'clock the light of the clouds can be glimpsed over the deserted city. It begins to snow, flakes settle on the streets, few notice, even if the news ends up in the newspapers the next day.
The big snow
It seems like an isolated event, during the night there is already no trace of those few flakes, but the teeth are chattering like they haven't happened in almost twenty years. An exceptional cold wave hits all of Italy, pushed by a current of Russian-Balkan origin. In those hours between January 8 and 9, 1985, the temperature in Cagliari stops at zero degrees: the forecasts say that the impossible can happen in the winter that is paralyzing three quarters of the Peninsula, bringing first Rome and then Milan to their knees (a meter of snow), up to the shock of -23 degrees and the frozen Arno in Florence.
Surprise in the city
The light of dawn is obscured by a mass of imposing clouds that quickly envelop the capital: it is almost seven o'clock on Wednesday 9, the snow appears again, but this time everything is much more serious. In a few minutes the flakes multiply, the city wakes up covered in white. It is the day of days, the people of Cagliari take to the streets to celebrate an unrepeatable morning. The precipitation intensifies as the hours pass, at times it is almost a blizzard: cars move with difficulty, slipping on the ice, buses are forced to stop. In the center you can only move on foot, chains are nowhere to be found, DIY salt spreaders are unable to make any impact. You can only wait for the sky to change its plans.
All still
Offices and schools remain closed: the snow falls continuously until the afternoon - in the end it will be about fifteen centimeters - the maximum temperature stops at 1 degree, the all-time record in modern records. The people of Cagliari flock to Poetto and especially to Monte Urpinu, where sleds appear, even those improvised with cardboard boxes. The flakes appear at intervals even in the evening, until the last appearance at dawn on Thursday 10 January, when the thermometer even reads minus 2. Then the sun takes over, even if at the end of the morning it does not go above 5 degrees: the temperature remains very low for a few more days, so much so that the snow on the roofs resists for the entire weekend.
An Island in White
The white blanket in those days of January covers almost the entire island: there is snow in Oristano, Bosa and even Carloforte where it hasn't been there for fifty years. Flakes in Alghero and La Maddalena, other fortresses with a traditionally mild climate. In the inland areas the situation is critical. Nuoro stops for days, all the passes of Gennargentu are blocked. Farmers and breeders are isolated.
That January 9th remains crystallized in the memories of those who were there and seems almost unreal for the younger ones, accustomed to the winter without winter.
Julius Zasso