A helicopter flies over the Marmolada, where on Sunday an avalanche claimed the lives of at least seven people /
There are still five missing from the avalanche caused on Sunday due to the detachment of a glacier in the Italian Alps, which leaves seven dead
There are only five people missing, all of Italian nationality, due to the avalanche caused last Sunday by the detachment of a huge mass of ice from the Marmolada glacier, in the eastern Italian Alps. The avalanche leaves 7 dead and 8 injured, one of whom was discharged on Tuesday. Although initially it was feared that the number of missing was higher, the authorities managed in the last few hours to locate several people who were initially mistakenly on the list of mountaineers who had been lost track of.
Among the lucky ones who have managed to survive the avalanche is Riccardo Franchin, a 27-year-old Italian engineer who was climbing the Marmolada glacier along with three other people who are still missing. “I heard a noise and raised my head. I saw that the mountain was falling on us and I started running as fast as I could. In a very short time I was hit by the avalanche and lost consciousness », Riccardo told from a hospital in Trento, where he is admitted, to his father, Mario Franchin, who later transmitted his testimony to ‘Corriere della Sera’. The young man explained that the arrival of the mass of ice, snow and rocks was so sudden that he did not even have time to feel pain before passing out.
When he woke up after a time of emptiness that he doesn’t know if it lasted a few seconds or several minutes, Riccardo began to realize what had happened. He was confused, but he managed to get to his feet and look around him, finding no sign of his companions. “I didn’t see anyone,” he told his father. It was then that he decided to go to a shelter, where he saw another mountaineer who gave him first aid. In addition to scratches on his face, arms and legs, he has a trauma to his liver that he will be able to overcome without sequelae.
The doctors consider that Riccardo has been miraculously saved and the father cannot explain how his son is still alive. Despite the joy, he assures that the two are very worried about the other three people who were with him. Among them is a friend and neighbor of Riccardo. “We were very apprehensive about everyone up there,” Mario said, hoping that other hikers as lucky as his son might be found.
Although the rescuers consider it very unlikely that more survivors will be located, the rescue operations do not cease and this Tuesday the drones located some clothing and mountain material in the area where the avalanche occurred. “Some cannot even identify themselves with a part of the body,” acknowledged Maurizio Dellantonio, president of Socorro Alpino, the body that is leading the search operations. “The important thing is to give the relatives certainty about what has been found,” he added, asking for time to be able to recover and study the materials found.
Despite the danger of further detachment of the glacier, groups of hikers who intend to climb the Marmolada continue to come. There are also curious onlookers who want to see with their own eyes and as close as possible the place where the tragedy took place. Given this situation, the mayor of Canazei, Giovanni Bernard, the town from which the rescue operations are being directed and located at the foot of the mountain, decided to close the accesses to Marmolada alleging security reasons.
“There is still a risk that the remaining block of ice will break off. All the activities we do take this aspect into account,” Dellantonio confirmed, recalling that experts are “very concerned” about the existing fractures in the part of the glacier that has not broken off. “We have a duty to guarantee everyone’s safety,” recalled the ‘number one’ of Alpine Relief.
The President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, also called for maximum attention, considering what happened in the Marmolada “a symbolic element of what climate change produces if it is not governed.” For this reason, he invited all countries to take seriously the challenge posed by global warming, in particular those that “do not commit” to confronting the problem.
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