LISBON – Portuguese authorities were investigating on Thursday what caused a Lisbon funicular railway popular with tourists to hurtle down a hill, killing at least 16 people and injuring 22 when it crashed into a building.
The mangled wreckage of a yellow tram-like carriage, which carries people up and down a steep hillside in the Portuguese capital, lay where it had left the track and hit a building on Wednesday, just metres from its twin at the bottom of the steep 265-metre slope. The traction cable linking them had snapped.
Lisbon resident Abel Esteves, 75, and his wife and grandson were among 40 passengers in the lower car who saw the carriage plunge towards them before derailing at the last second.
“I told my wife: ‘We’re all going to die here’,” he said. “It picked up a brutal speed, took a slight turn and hit the building with a loud bang.”
