A 3 -year -old boy with a funicular disaster that shocked Portugal

There is a tangible sense of shock to the faces of the people who look at the remains of a function of a funicular disaster in the Portuguese capital, where 16 people were killed-but a three-year-old German boy was among the happy survivors.

He was pulled out of the carriage where his father died and his mother was among more than 20 other people who were injured.

Citizens of Portugal, South Korea, Switzerland, Canada, Germany and Ukraine are believed to be among the dead, police say.

It is not yet clear what caused the crash. The public transport operator of the capital, Caris, said all the Funricers would be inspected and that it had started an independent investigation.

Portugal’s political elite appeared in St. Dominic’s church on Thursday night for a service held in honor of the killed.

Outside the church, people called for an in -depth investigation into the incident. “We need people to know that they are safe here,” said a woman while others nodded.

A local resident told the BBC that he was “still processing” what happened when he passed by the site of the crash, where the remains of the cabled derailed and collided in a building lay on the ground.

“It’s very, very sad,” she said.

Others gathered and took pictures of the remains or stood silently and watched. Two Singapore tourists said they had been planned to drive the cabled on Wednesday, but changed their plans at the last moment.

“It’s scary … who knows, we may have been to this one,” one said. “It changes your perspective on life. You just don’t expect anything like this to happen.”

The guide Mariana Figuero was among those on the site of the crash on Wednesday night. She said she had been injured by what she witnessed.

D -Ja Figueiredo said she had heard a big crash and rushed to the scene, near where her tucuk was parked.

“I was there in five seconds,” she said. “People started jumping from the windows inside the tuft at the bottom of the hill. Then I saw another (further) that was already crushed.

“I started climbing the hill to help people, but when I got there, the only thing I heard was silence.”

D -Ja Figueiredo said that when she and others began to pull the roof from the cable, they saw dead bodies inside.

She said she was a witness to rescue children and tried to help people with broken bones and calm people in trouble.

“Many people were crying around me. They were very scared. I was trying to calm them down.”

A man who was on another funnel at the bottom of the hill during the crash told reporters that he thought he would die.

“As much as I live more years, I will never take the funicular again,” he said.

Police have not officially indicated any of the dead or wounded, but on Thursday at a press conference said they believe that two Canadians, one German and one Ukrainian citizen, are considered among the dead.

This was followed by a more update, in which police said they believed that five Portuguese, two South Korean and one Swiss citizen had been identified.

The Portuguese Transport Union said the security of the Funricular Brake Andre Jorge Gonsalvs Marquez is among those kilos.

The charity Santa Casa to Misiria, whose employees used the funicular for their trip to the work, confirmed that four of their workers were killed in the accident.

An employee, Valdemar Bastos, told the BBC that the charity staff, located at the top of a steep hill, often uses the funicular with tourists and elderly people.

“I’ve always felt safe,” he said. “I never thought that could happen.”

On Thursday, the head of the public transport operator of Lisbon Caris said all the funnels in the city would be closed until technical inspections have been carried out.

Pedro Gonzalo de Brito Alexo Bogas told reporters that the Gloria line would reopen in the future with a new carriage.

He said the company has increased its cost of maintaining the funicule – which has worked properly since 2007, but added that the cost of maintaining them has doubled in the last 10 years.

The findings of the investigation will be published soon, said Dr. De Brito Bogas, but declined to say when this would happen.

The footage shared on social media showed the broken yellow casualties, overturned on the cobblestone street and the people running from the area while the smoke filled the air.

Several passengers trapped in the remains had to be released from emergency persons, local authorities said.

Lisbon officials had initially set the death rate at 17, but later this issue was revised to 16 after finding that a person who died in a hospital overnight was counted twice.

The cable is a type of rail system that allows you to travel up and down steep slopes, and in Lisbon they are a decisive means of navigating the steep, cobblestone streets in the city.

City Funricular Railways – Glória, Lavra, Bica and Graça – are a popular tourist attraction, as the bright yellow tram vehicles snake through often cutting, hilly streets.

Gloria was discovered in 1885 and electrified three decades later.

He travels about 275 meters (900 feet) from restaurants, central town square, to the picturesque streets of Bayro Alto. Travel only takes three minutes.

The two carriages along the Gloria route are attached to the opposite ends of the carriage cable, which is pulled from electric motors.

As one carriage travels down, his weight lifts the other, allowing them to climb and lower at the same time, reducing the energy needed to transport them.

The second, intact carriage can only be seen meters from the remains at the bottom of the hill.