A picturesque Italian ski resort has become the latest victim of viral social media trends, as thousands of TikTok-influenced tourists descended upon the small town of Roccaraso, overwhelming local infrastructure and sparking outrage among locals.
The chaos unfolded after Neapolitan TikTok star Rita De Crescenzo posted a series of videos promoting the resort to her 1.7 million followers. Her content, which showcased Roccaraso’s snow-covered slopes, went viral, attracting an unexpected surge of visitors. Many of these tourists booked budget-friendly day trips offered by travel agencies, with some packages costing as little as €20, including transportation and a meal.
Consequently, on Sunday, 26 January, Roccaraso, a town of just 1,500 residents, was inundated with an estimated 10,000 additional visitors. Reports indicate that 220 buses arrived from Naples, clogging roads and causing extensive traffic delays. While Roccaraso is no stranger to winter tourism, hosting around 35,000 skiers and sightseers on peak weekends, the influx of TikTok-driven tourists pushed local capacity to its limits.
The town’s ski facilities, parking areas and restaurants were overrun. Viral social media footage captured scenes of large crowds struggling to access ski lifts, impromptu sledding on makeshift contraptions such as saucepans, and abandoned trash, including discarded barbecues and even evidence of fires set directly on the slopes.
Mayor Francesco Di Donato described the event as a “real assault” on the town. Complaints flooded in from regular visitors and local residents who found themselves stuck in hours-long traffic jams. Some tourists accused the authorities of discrimination against Neapolitans, an assertion Di Donato rejected, emphasizing that the sheer volume of visitors created a serious safety risk.
“Racism towards Neapolitans? Not really,” Di Donato told Corriere della Sera. “Roccaraso welcomes and wants to welcome more tourists, but we want civilised skiers. With €30 you cannot even ski, as a ski pass costs €60. Roccaraso is not able to withstand the kind of assault we had on Sunday – for example, we cannot put 1,000 portable toilets in a ski resort.”
In response to the chaos, local authorities implemented emergency crowd control measures. These included capping the number of buses permitted in Roccaraso on weekends to 100, requiring advance online bookings and banning unauthorized parking in key areas.
Despite the restrictions, De Crescenzo has doubled down on her enthusiasm for the resort, promising to return with even more visitors. While on the one hand claiming she merely posted content that reached a large audience and she is not responsible for their actions, immediately after she proudly said she would return the following weekend “and you will see that, thanks to my videos, even more people will come than last weekend.”