By November 9, 1917, the Italians had reached their more or less prepared positions on the lower Piave and frantically began digging themselves in. In the north, however, matters did not go well with the Italians. Austro-Hungarian troops succeeded in pressing forward in the Sugana Valley and in the upper Piave valley. After desperate fighting in the streets Asiago was captured by them. This town is some twenty miles west of the Piave and only a few miles across the Austro-Italian border. On the lower Piave the Italians crossed to the west bank, blowing up behind them all bridges and established themselves fairly firm behind the river from Susegana, in the foothills of the Alps, to the Adriatic, a line of some forty miles. The Austrians extended their gains in the north on November 10, 1917. Belluno, on the upper Piave, was taken by them, and so was Vidor and its bridgehead, some twenty-five miles downstream, not, however, until the bridge itself had been blown up by the Italians. Fighting on the lower Piave was restricted to artillery and machine-gun firing. As a result of their gains in the Belluno sector, the Austro-Germans claimed on November 12, 1917, to have captured about 14,000 prisoners and numerous guns and to have reached Feltre, a small town at a bend of the middle Piave. Heavy fighting occurred on November 12, 1917, on the Asiago plateau. But the Italian line, established there from Monte Gallio-Longara-Meletta di Gallio, held. Between the Brenta and the Piave the Austro-Germans occupied territory previously evacuated by the Italians and reached contact with the Italian lines. On the lower Piave the Italian line held, except at one point, about twelve miles northwest of the mouth of the Piave. There, near Monte San Dona di Piave, about twenty-three miles northeast of Venice, enemy groups succeeded, with the aid of large boats, in crossing to the west bank of the Piave. Italian counterattacks, however, promptly drove them back and the Italian lines were reestablished without a break. On November 13, 1917, the Central Powers again registered successes. They took Primolano on the upper Brenta and Feltre on the middle Piave. Near the Adriatic they crossed the lower Piave and gained a slight foothold on its western bank, which, however, they were unable to extend in width in spite of determined efforts. A surprise attack against the Italian rear from the north in the region of Lake Garda failed. New attempts on the part of the Austro-German forces to cross the lower Piave, made repeatedly during November 14, 1917, were promptly repulsed by the Italians, whose power of resistance gradually seemed to stiffen. The same fate met renewed Teuton attacks along the entire front from Asiago to the Piave River, attempted on November 15, 1917. In this the Italians were assisted by opening the floodgates of the Piave River.