Rome (AP) – Three tourists, including a British couple, were among the four people who died when a mountain camp had lunch in a ravine south of Naples, the authorities confirmed on Saturday.
The Britain Development Office, the Commonwealth and Development said in a statement that it is “supporting the families of a British couple who have died in Italy and are in contact with local authorities.”
On Friday, one day after the accident, a spokesman for the mayor of Vico Ecuario had said that the couple were brothers, but confirmed on Saturday that it was based on bad information.
An Israeli woman was the third foreign victim to be identified after Thursday’s accident.
The fourth victim was the Italian driver of the cable car. A fifth tourist, who is said to be the brother of the Israeli victim, is in a stable but critical condition in a hospital in Naples, authorities said.
The initial reports suggested that a traction cable may have been broken when the cable car promoted to Monte Faito, in the city of Castellammare Di Stabia. The cable car plunged into a ravine after stopping very close to the station at the top of the peak, about 1,050 meters (3,400 feet).
Sixteen passengers were helped to get out of another cable car that was trapped in the air near the foot of the mountain after the incident.
The accident occurred only one week after the cable car, which is popular for its views to Mount Vesubio and Naples’ bay, reproduced for the season. Average that averages around 110,000 visitors every year.
Emergency services, including the Alpine rescue of Italy, more than 50 firefighters, police and civil protection staff, worked at night in severe climatic conditions, with FOG and strong winds that hinder rescue operations.
“The traction cable broke. The emergency brake downstream worked, but obviously not that of the cabin that was the station,” Luigi Vicinanza, mayor of Castellammare di Stabia, said on Thursday. He added that he had regular leg control controls in the cable car line, which runs 3 kilometers (1.8 miles) from the city to the top of the mountain.
Local prosecutors have opened an investigation into possible involuntary homicide, which will imply an inspection of cable stations, the pylons, the two cabins and the cable, the authorities said on Friday.
The company that directs the service, the public transport firm of EAV, said that the seasonal cable car had been made with all the security conditions required.
“The reopening had tasks placed a week after three months of tests every day, day and night,” said Eav, Umberto de Gregorio. “This is something inexplicable.”
The Gregorio said the technical experts believed that there was no connection between the severe climate and the cause of the accident. “There is an automatic system. When the wind exceeds a certain level, the cable car stops automatically,” he said.
The Monte Faito cable car opened in 1952. Four people died in 1960 when a pylon broke.
Italy has registered two similar fatal accidents that involve the clocks in recent years.
A telephone accident in May 2021 in northern Italy killed 14 people, including six Israelis, including a family of four. In 1998, a low -flying American military jet cut the cable of a skiing elevator in Cavaleses, in Los Dolomitas, killing 20 people.