More than thirty people were injured, several seriously, in a chairlift accident on Saturday January 18 in a ski resort in the Pyrenees in the north-east of Spain, near the French border, announced local authorities.
“We are talking about 30 to 35 injured, serious, very serious or less serious”declared on public television TVE Miguel Angel Clavero, director of emergency services in the Aragon region, where the Astun station is located. “Obviously, there was a problem with the pulley of one of the chairlifts, which led to a loss of tension in the cable and the fall of some chairlifts”he explained.
The president of the Aragon region, Jorge Azcon, said for his part that the three most seriously affected people had been transferred to hospital, one of them, a woman, by helicopter. Local media reported a total of nine very seriously injured people, which Mr. Azcon did not confirm. All the skiers who remained suspended in their chairlift were able to be rescued, he added.
A field hospital installed
“We suddenly heard a noise and fell to the ground in the chairlift. We bounced five times, up and down, and our backs hurt and took a beating, but there were people who fell off the chairlifts.”said Maria Moreno, one of the victims, on public television. “We were very scared”she added.
-A young person who witnessed the incident, also on TVE, said he saw a cable from the chairlift mechanism jump. “Suddenly the chairlifts started bouncing and people were flying”he described.
Five helicopters and around fifteen ambulances were mobilized to evacuate the injured to hospitals near the station, where a field hospital was set up, according to the emergency services.
In a message published on X, the Spanish Prime Minister, Pedro Sanchez, said he “shocked by the information about the accident in Astun station” and indicated that he had “offered all the support” from central government to local authorities.
