ABSTRACTRecords exist of the flooding of Venice from the days of the Republic. During the last century flooding incidents have become more severe due to subsidence of the city and rising water levels in the Adriatic. Calamitous flooding occurred in 1966, and two devastating floods were experienced during the last decade. The ‘Special Law for Venice’, enacted by the Italian Parliament in 1973, paved the way for a competition to devise a flood‐prevention scheme.A consortium of Italian contractors, who were commissioned to submit proposals for the implementation of the scheme, designated Technital Spa of Verona to carry out the design of the flood‐prevention works and improvements within the lagoon. This resulted in the design of three movable barrages to seal off the Venice lagoon in the event of a flood. The construction of a full‐size gate and caisson (the prototype of the eighty gates forming the barrages) was subsequently authorized.This paper describes the experimental module containing the buoyant gate and its caisson, its novel features as well as some of the events leading up to its design and con