Mottarone cable car, “almost usual runs without brakes in the last month”

Cabin number 3 of the Stresa-Mottarone cable car plant had the emergency brakes deactivated not only on Sunday 23 May when the rupture of the cable triggered the accident in which 14 people lost their lives, but also the day before, Saturday 22 May. And a detail contained in the request for validation of the detention that reports part of the statements made by Gabriele Tadini, head of the plant currently in prison in Verbania. From what transpires Tadini was at work on the Sunday of the disaster, he was in the structure of the cable car that is in the area of ​​the lido di Stresa. He was near the monitors when the video surveillance system’s camera went out and he sensed that something was wrong. He saw nothing, nor heard the thud of cabin number 3 crashing to the ground, on the beaten earth, before rolling and ending its run against a tree. assumed responsibility for deactivating the safety brake system. A choice linked to the fact that the system constantly signaled a brake problem, that is, a loss of pressure that triggered the shoes and therefore stopped the stroke. Tadini declares that last Sunday “this choice to inhibit the braking system was his only, without notifying anyone, neither the owner Luigi Nerini, nor the operating director the engineer Enrico Perocchio”, both in a state of detention, the document reads signed by the prosecutor Olimpia Bossi and the prosecutor Laura Carrera. Tadini “added that even the previous day, Saturday 22 May, given that cabin number 3 presented the same problems, he had avoided removing the ‘fork’, making it travel all day with the braking system disabled. He had not, however, noted the event in the journal, nor notified anyone “. A fake that on Saturday, just by chance, did not make any victims. In the request signed by the prosecutor of Verbania, after the stops that took place on Tuesday at dawn, Tadini is accused of not having reported “promptly to the Ustif of Piedmont and Valle d’Aosta (special office for transport to fixed installations – competent for the territory – of the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport) – all anomalies or irregularities found in the operation of the plant “. Nerini intolerant of compliance with safety rules Luigi Nerini, manager of the Mottarone cable car and the Alpyland attraction facility – where two accidents occurred in which an employee and a passenger were injured (there is a criminal case in progress ) – must remain in prison “given the already demonstrated intolerance to scrupulous compliance with the safety measures aimed at protecting the safety of users of this type of plant”. It is one of the passages of the request for validation of the arrest issued against the man now in prison in Verbania, in custody, for the tragedy of Mottarone in which 14 people lost their lives. “Despite the seriousness of the conduct and the consequent consequences, the detainees did not have a resipiscent attitude presenting themselves immediately to the judicial authority to assume their responsibilities. This consideration assumes greater gravity and importance for Luigi Nerini and Enrico Perocchio who, rushing to the scene on the day of the tragic events, they were able to see the bodies of the mangled victims, lying on the ground thrown out of booth number 3 or stuck inside it “, we read in another passage.