The massacre of the cable car, rescuers: "The emergency brake did not work"

• Mottarone, families and boyfriends on a trip to the mountain: lives broken in the tragic accident

• Stresa-Mottarone cable car: cabin falls into the void.

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• Mottarone, families and boyfriends on a trip to the mountain: lives broken in the tragic accident

• Piedmont, Stresa-Mottarone cable car accident: cabin falls, 14 dead.

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May 24, 2021

Shortly after 10, with the arrival at the Palazzo dei Congressi in Stresa of the Minister of Infrastructures Enrico Giovannini and the head of civil protection Fabrizio Curcio, the "technical table" of comparison to try to understand what happened yesterday on the Mottarone where the rupture of the cableway of the cableway on Lake Maggiore caused a cableway to fall, killing 14 people. The meeting is attended by the president of the Piedmont Region Alberto Cirio, the vice-president and councilor for the mountains Fabio Carosso and the councilor for Infrastructure and Transport and Civil Protection Marco Gabusi, the mayor of Stresa Marcella Severino and the Prefect of Verbania Angelo Sidoti.

Among the main questions to be resolved, the causes of the breakage of the cable pulling the cabins and the failure of the automatic safety brake to intervene. Expected investigations will be ordered by the Verbania Public Prosecutor's Office, which has opened a file for multiple manslaughter and which could soon proceed with the first entries in the register of suspects.

In addition to the breaking of the cable, the investigation by the Verbania Public Prosecutor's Office will have to establish why the emergency brake of the cabin did not work. "These are all suppositions, but I think there was a double problem - says the provincial head of the Alpine Rescue, Matteo Gasparini -: the break of the cable and the failure of the emergency brake. We do not know why it did not activate while in the cabin. downstream it worked ". Failure to activate the brake, he explains, "caused the cabin, after the cable break, to pick up speed, starting to descend, ending up catapulted out of the support cables".

The emergency call was launched, around 12.15, by a person who was in the area and who witnessed the fall of the cable car cabin, which took place a hundred meters downstream of the station that rises on the top of Mottarone, at 1492 meters of share. The Piedmontese Alpine and Speleological Rescue technician in the Piedmontese 118 Operations Center, in close coordination with the health personnel, sent two helicopters from the Regional Helicopter Rescue Service to the site from the Borgosesia and Alessandria bases, while the 118 helicopter from the Turin base it was sent to Borgosesia and kept on standby. 

The helicopter-transported teams identified the two survivors and proceeded with cardiopulmonary resuscitation maneuvers before stabilizing the two patients, both minors, and transferring them by helicopter to the Regina Margherita hospital in Turin, where one later died. In the meantime, the ground teams of the Alpine Rescue arrived on site and proceeded with the recovery of the bodies, with the extraction of those still present in the cabin and handed them over to the judicial police authorities for recognition operations. Carabinieri, Alpine Rescue of the financial police, firefighters and Civil Protection also intervened.

The Verbania prosecutor has ordered the seizure of the plant and is investigating for multiple manslaughter. "For now we are proceeding for multiple manslaughter and negligent injuries, we must also verify the crime of an attack on transport safety, also based on the public nature or otherwise of the plant". explained the prosecutor Olimpia Bossi at the end of the long inspection of the Mottarone. "The entire area has been seized - he adds - we will begin with the technical surveys to ascertain the causes of the accident. The victims have been identified but we are alerting the relatives".

The plant, as it turns out, is owned by the Municipality of Stresa.

The mayor explained that the plant maintainer confirmed that all the checks had been made without detecting anomalies.

A fact confirmed by the lawyers of the company that manages it: "The checks, verifications, maintenance are all in place. Then what happened is all to be verified" said the lawyer Pasquale Pantano. 

The cable car had reopened to the public yesterday, like the other plants in Italy, after more than a year of closure due to the Covid emergency.

The plant connects the Lido di Stresa square to the top of the mountain that divides Lake Maggiore from that of Orta.

A scenic stretch lasting 20 minutes divided into two sections.

It had been completely overhauled and subjected to extraordinary maintenance between 2014 and 2016. Inaugurated and entered into service on 1 August 1970, the bifune system was divided into two sections: from Stresa to the 2,351-meter Alpine and from the Alpine to the Mottarone of 3,020 meters.

Five families killed in the accident

The tragedy of the cable car hit five families, three residents in Lombardy, one in Emilia Romagna and one in Calabria. In particular, a family residing in Pavia was of Israeli origin. Below is the list of victims:

Biran Amit, born in Israel on February 2, 1991 and residing in Pavia

Peleg Tal, born in Israel on August 13, 1994 and residing in Pavia

Biran Tom, born in Pavia on March 16, 2019 and residing in Pavia

Cohen Konisky Barbara, born in Israel on 11 February 1950

Cohen Itshak, born in Israel on 17 November 1939

Shahaisavandi Mohammadreza, born in Iran on 25 August 1998, resident in Diamante (Cosenza)

Cosentino Serena, born in Belvedere Marittimo (Cosenza) on 4 May 1994 and residing in Diamante (Cosenza)

Malnati Silvia, born in Varese on 7 July 1994, residing in Varese

Merlo Alessandro, born in Varese on 13 April 1992, resident in Varese

Zorloni Vittorio born in Seregno, Milan, on 8 September 1966, residing in Vedano Olona (Varese); his wife Elisabetta Persanini, 37, together with their six-year-old son, Mattia 

Gasparro Angelo Vito, born in Bari on 24 April 1976, resident in Castel San Giovanni (Piacenza)

Pistolato Roberta, born in Bari on 23 May 1981, resident in Castel San Giovanni (Piacenza). 

Leitner: last check ok last November

The Leitner company of Vipiteno learned with "deep sorrow the news of the tragedy that took place between Stresa and Mottarone". With regard to the maintenance of the plant, "the last magnetoscopic inspection of the rope was carried out in November 2020 and the results of the same did not reveal any critical issues". "The deepest and most moving thought of our company, which remains at complete disposal together with its technicians to try to identify the causes of the terrible tragedy as soon as possible, goes to the victims, the injured and their families and all the communities involved", declares Anton Seeber, president of Leitner.

"The tragic accident at the Stresa-Mottarone cable car arouses deep pain for the victims and great apprehension for those who are struggling for life in these hours. I express the participation of all of Italy to the affected families and communities in mourning. alongside the call to rigorous compliance with all safety regulations for all conditions concerning the transport of people ". Thus the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella in a note.