Worker trapped for 11 hours under collapsed medieval tower in Rome dies after being pulled from rubble
A man has died after 11 hours trapped under the rubble of a partially collapsed medieval tower in Rome.
Octay Stroici, a 66-year-old Romanian worker, died at Umberto I hospital shortly after being pulled from the debris, Italian news agency ANSA reports, citing health sources.
Lamberto Giannini, city police chief, said that he had been taken to hospital in a “serious condition”. He reportedly suffered a cardiac arrest in the ambulance.
As many as 140 firefighters worked for nearly half a day to rescue Stroici as his wife followed the effort.
“The rescue operation took a long time because every time a part of the worker’s body was freed, further collapses occurred, burying him again under the rubble,” Giannini told state television station Rai.
Parts of the 29-metre Torre dei Conti, near the Colosseum, crashed to the ground on Monday morning. A second incident happened while firefighters were working on the structure. None of the firefighters were injured.
The first collapse occurred after 10:30 GMT. Eleven workers were on the site at the time, local media reported. Another then occurred as rescuers were pulling labourers from the rubble, around 90 minutes later.
A second worker, 64, was pulled out almost immediately and hospitalised with serious but not life-threatening head injuries, while two more workers suffered minor injuries and declined hospital treatment.
“It all happened suddenly,” one of the workers on site, who was not named, told ANSA. “Then I only saw the cloud of dust and the rescuers.”
Gaetano La Manna, another worker, told Il Messaggero: “I heard a bang and everything came crashing down, everything collapsed.”
Debris fell from above and cut his face and the back of his head.
Adriano De Acutis, commander of the Rome Fire Brigade, said Stroici was “was conscious when he emerged”.
He was pulled from the rubble at around 10:30 p.m.
The prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation for negligent disaster and negligent injury.
