- Title: Austria: Rescue Teams Recover First Bodies From Blaze Tunnel
- Date: 13th November 2000
- Summary: Austrian rescue teams have recovered the first bodies of at least 159 skiers killed by an Alpine tunnel blaze at the weekend, but could not explain how the mountain railway car was consumed so suddenly by fire. Provincial authorities said November 13, 46 bodies had been retrieved of which 29 had already been helicoptered to the institute for forensic medicine in the nearby regional capital Salzburg for identification. Rescue workers had to cope with the harrowing sight of bodies burned beyond all recognition as well as the danger that the roof of the steep 3. 2 km (two-mile) tunnel might collapse near the scene of Austria's worst peacetime disaster. Rescue workers - amongst them soldiers from the Austrian army - could be seen near the mouth of a side tunnel leading onto that in which the blaze took place. Some rescue workers could be seen washing their charcoal-blackened hands as helicopters took off and landed nearby. Chief pathologist Edith Tutsch-Bauer said three teams were ready in Salzburg to begin autopsies but the dead were so badly burned that no visual recognition was possible. Tutsch-Bauer said: "So far I have seen 3 or 4 of the victims, what was left was completely charred remains. " Provincial Governor Franz Schausberger said: "The forensic experts are telling us that the final identification will take about 3 weeks. Only then can the victims' bodies be released. " At the institute itself workers placed a tarpaulin over the entrance to a garage where army trucks carrying the remains would park. Families and friends have brought clothes, toothbrushes and razors used by the dead to help find a DNA match, but Tutsch-Bauer warned it would take three to four weeks to finish the forensic work. Among the dead in Saturday's disaster were 92 Austrian and 37 German skiers. German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder will join Austrian leaders on Friday at a memorial service in Salzburg cathedral. Ten Japanese schoolchildren and eight U. S. forces personnel based in Germany also died, together with four Slovenians, two people from the Netherlands, one from the Czech Republic and 40-year-old British skiing instructor Kevin Challis. Twelve people towards the rear of the train managed to smash their way out and flee downward, away from the noxious fumes. But others were overcome as they fled uphill, as were three people at the station at the top of the funicular railway. A busload of relatives of the Japanese victims arrived at Kaprun as the alpine village, plunged like the rest of the country into mourning, tried to return to some semblance of normality. Other funicular railways at Austrian ski resorts were shut down for safety checks.
- Embargoed:
- Keywords:
- Access Restrictions:This media cannot be downloaded as there may be copyright restrictions. Please contact us for more information
- Location: AUSTRIA KAPRUN
- Reuters ID: LDL0012E3VTXN
- Aspect Ratio: 4:3
- Story Text:
- Copyright Holder: Reuters Archive
- Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2014. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp