The Venice bridge, from which a tourist bus fell on Tuesday evening and killed 21 people, is dilapidated and will need years of renovation, including to close a “break” in the safety rail, the authorities reported on Thursday. Italian media.
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A project to rehabilitate this bridge, built about fifty years ago, was launched in 2016, but work only began in September and had not yet reached the part of the bridge where the tragedy occurred, said Venice’s deputy mayor in charge of transport, Renato Boraso, in several press interviews.
The electric bus, which was carrying around forty foreign tourists from the historic center to their campsite, crashed into the safety railing, rolled for several meters before entering a 1.5 meter wide “gap”, breaking through a second barrier and finally falling ten meters below, near a railway line, according to media reconstructions.
The exact circumstances of the accident are not yet known, but the preferred hypothesis is that the driver was unwell.
“The two meters without a barrier is how the bus crashed,” summarizes the daily Il Corriere della Sera, while La Stampa denounces “the safety rail scandal.”
“Although these barriers do not comply with current legislation, they did at the time of their construction. “The gaps would have been closed next year thanks to the work already agreed,” Renato Boraso defended himself in the press. “I am against our services looking like assassins.”
“Since 2016, our services have been involved in the renovation of this section of the safety rail,” he said, adding: “Without a tender, we cannot award work worth seven million euros.” “Let us ask ourselves why in Italy Procedure for carrying out work must be so lengthy,” he concluded.
“The work, which began in September, reached a distance of 400 meters,” he said.
The death toll from the tragedy rose to 21 dead and 15 injured, including five in serious condition. In addition to the Italian driver, nine Ukrainians, four Romanians, three Germans, two Portuguese, a Croatian and a South African died.