Scandal in Italy: the owner knew that the fallen cable car “showed anomalies”

ROMA.- Just three days from the tragic fall of a cable car that killed 14 people –Among them, two children-, three men were arrested today in the city of Stresa, considered guilty of a disaster that shook Italy. This terrible accident, in which only a 5-year-old boy survived, according to prosecutors, ultimately did not happen because of human error, as previously believed, but because of a failure due to the thirst for money.

After questioning by the police and experts from the Verbania prosecutor’s office, which since last Sunday has been investigating the tragedy, the owner of the cable car that leads from Stresa, on Lake Maggiore, to the top of Mount Mottarone, as well as two managers, confessed that they knew that for at least a month, due to certain anomalies, the braking system of emergency was blocked.

“They were convinced that a cable break would never have been verified and was at risk which unfortunately resulted in the deaths of 14 people that on Sunday they were on the funicular, ”Olimpia Bossi, the Verbania prosecutor who took up the case, told reporters, stressing that“ the reconstructed picture is disconcerting.

In fact, he explained that if, despite the fact that there were some anomalies in the emergency braking system, they made the cable car work the same way, it was not to lose money. Because repairing this defect would mean, after the reopening of April 26, another prolonged period of paralysis, after those caused by the containments due to the pandemic, and the loss of tourists and money. Thus, those in charge decided to operate the cable car in the same way, with “the certainty that the traction cable would never have been cut”. Something that, no one yet knows why, finally happened.

The lawyer determined the arrest of Luigi Nerini, 56-year-old businessman, owner of the Mottarone funicular for decades – which previously billed 1.8 million euros per year -; your second, Gabriele Tadini, 63 years old, factory manager and personnel coordinator; and the engineer Enrico Perocchio, 51-year-old external cable car consultant. On them hangs the charge of Multiple homicide, very serious culpable injuries to a child (the only survivor) and dismissal and willful omission of precautions made worse by the disaster.

Normally, the emergency braking system of a cable car should always be active. This allows the cabin to be immediately blocked in the event of cable failure. Something that happened last Sunday with the cabin going down to the valley (one of the two from the elevator), at the time of the accident of the other, who was about to reach the top .

So, as it was rebuilt and for reasons still unknown – because it was apparently in good condition and had been overhauled -, a thread has been cut. But the brake system was blocked by an iron called a “forchetta”, an instrument that all Italians could see in photos and videos of the damaged cabin. This iron is generally used when maintenance tests are carried out and the cabin moves completely empty, so that it does not get stuck all the time, which requires the intervention of an assistant.

The truth is that, with the brake system stuck, when the cable was cut, the cabin, which was carrying 15 people – half of its capacity, according to anti-coronavirus regulations – for 10 seconds, it slid back. at a speed of 100 kilometers per hour. hour, until violently colliding with a pole. He then fell 54 meters to the ground and rolled for several meters until he was stopped by fir trees in the underlying forest.

Although until now it was believed that the brake system was blocked because the red “forchetta” had been forgotten by human error, the prosecution concluded that this instrument was there on purpose, which caused a scandal. “It was placed to avoid continuous blockages of the cable car,” said the lawyer. “The system presented anomalies and would have required a radical correction, with a prolonged shutdown of the media”, he added, in a lack of profit which the leaders did not want to assume.

It remains to be seen why the steel cable was cut but, both in this case, as in the case of the brakes, “the main thing is in the maintenance,” experts said.