Several dead and missing after building explosion
A serious gas explosion destroyed entire houses in Sicily. There is also a pregnant woman among the missing persons.
Serious consequences of a detonation: firefighters clean up the scene in Ravanusa.
Photo: Fire Brigade / AFP (12. Dezember 2021)
A severe gas explosion destroyed entire houses in Sicily and killed several people. Three people have so far been recovered dead, six are still missing, said Elisa Vaccaro from the Agrigento prefecture on Sunday, according to the Adnkronos news agency. Two women were pulled alive from the rubble by the rescuers in the town of Ravanusa. Among the missing was a heavily pregnant woman. Around 100 people could no longer get into their homes because the area looked like a field of rubble.
It was around 8:30 p.m. on Saturday when a loud bang terrified people. The accident was probably caused by a gas leak due to a defective line. The four-story house collapsed as a result of the detonation, and several other buildings were partially destroyed. Videos from the fire brigade showed debris in the distance, dust and piles of rubble. Fires flared up again and again. Sniffer dogs searched the rubble. Allegedly, the missing and dead all come from the same family.
“We don’t hear any voices from the rubble, but we don’t give up hope,” said Luca Cari from the fire brigade, who was there with 100 rescuers. The search was like a race against time.
“It seems like Beirut,” said the head of the regional civil defense, Salvatore Cocina, the Adnkronos news agency with a view to the devastating explosion in the Lebanese capital. He spoke of shattered glass and debris that had been hurled dozens of meters from the site of the explosion. Cocina reported an area of 10,000 square meters, which was partly devastated, and four collapsed houses. Gas may have accumulated and then ignited. How was still unclear. The public prosecutor’s office opened an investigation.
Mayor speaks of “tragedy”
“Suddenly the light was gone, and then the roof and the floor came down,” the media quoted the 80-year-old resident Rosa Carmina, who, like her sister-in-law, was rescued from the house. She was trapped under rubble and screamed for help. A man who was visiting the house said: “It was like an atomic bomb, we thought an airplane had crashed nearby.”
The mayor of the town with around 10,000 inhabitants in the south of the island speaks of a “tragedy”. “Several houses have been hit by the flames,” said Carmelo D’Angelo.
–The clean-up work in Ravanusa is already in full swing on Sunday.
Photo: Matteo Guidelli (Keystone / 12. Dezember 2021)
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