US tourist throws scooter down Rome’s Spanish Steps, causing €25,000 damage

A few days before, a 39-year-old Argentinian man was charged with breaking strict no-fly zone rules after crashing a drone into the roof of a prominent monument in central Rome.

He had been flying his drone in Piazza Venezia when he lost control of the device and sent it crashing into the roof of Palazzo Venezia, a 15th-century building from where the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini delivered some of his most famous speeches.

Such incidents are not exclusive to Rome: a week earlier two Mexican tourists crashed their drone into the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

Venice is also a popular target for badly behaved tourists. Police renewed their crackdown on uncouth visitors to the city last summer, saying the return of tourism had coincided with "signs of urban degradation".

Among those fined was a French tourist who paddled along the Grand Canal on his stand-up paddleboard, and two German women who sunbathed in bikinis by San Stae church.