Italy searches for at least 14 missing in the Alpine glacier and “mourns” 7 dead

Italy’s emergency teams are looking for at least 14 people under the rock and ice glacier that collapsed on Sunday in the Eastern Alps and “cries” seven dead, Prime Minister Mario Draghi declared today, who attributed the tragedy to the climate crisis.

“Today Italy mourns the victims and all Italian men and women join with affection. The government must reflect on what happened and take measures so that there is a low probability of it happening again or to avoid it,” said Draghi, visibly dismayed.

The Prime Minister went today to the town of Canazei, between the regions of Veneto and Trentino-Alto Adige (north), to supervise the search for the disappeared and convey the solidarity of the entire country to the families of the victims and the injured .

[Al menos 19 muertos en Pakistán tras caer por un barranco el autobús en el que viajaban]

A balance destined to worsen

The area, to which Draghi had to arrive by car as the weather conditions prevented her from completing the helicopter journey, she was swept away by the Marmolada glacier detachment down the mountain, dragging everything in its path.

It is a mass of ice and rock 200 meters long, 60 meters wide and 30 meters thick. It is as if two solid soccer fields thirty meters thick collapsed down the hillside, illustrated the president of Veneto, Luca Zaia.

The balance, for now provisional, consists of seven dead, the last one found on this Monday morning. The others are three Italians – two guides and a 27-year-old mountaineer named Filippo Bari – while there is also a Czech and two people yet to be identified.

The disappeared, confirmed by the reports of relatives who cannot locate them, are officially fourteen: ten Italians and four Czechs and Austrians, while the injured amount to eight, of varying degrees.

Up to twenty were feared missing but some have been located at their homes or other points, such as a 9-year-old boy.

However, the victims -very difficult to identify due to the state of the corpses- will probably increase in the next few hours, according to the rescuers, given that some witnesses maintain that there were thirty people on the hillside.

Difficult rescue work

The search for the disappeared resumed this morning after the gale that hit the area overnight and they are taking place by air with drones and helicopters, one of them with a system to detect the waves of mobile phones.

It is feared that the high temperatures could cause further collapses and endanger the emergency services.

“I want to thank everyone who has worked this day and a half. Civil Protection, firefighters, Alpine Relief, health authorities and all the volunteers for their generosity, professionalism and courage,” applauded the Prime Minister.

Because, he added, rescue operations are taking place “in a situation of great danger”.