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Rescue workers are trying to pull a man from the rubble of a medieval tower in central Rome that partly collapsed twice during renovations, trapping him on an upper floor and injuring another man.
The Torre dei Conti, located close to the Roman Forum ruins, suffered an initial collapse just after 11.30am (1030 GMT) on Monday, with falling debris reportedly hitting a 64-year-old worker.
He was taken to San Giovanni hospital in a critical condition. Francesco Rocca, Lazio’s regional president, said the worker’s injuries were not life-threatening.With hundreds of tourists and passersby looking on, firefighters then rescued three other workers from scaffolding on the 29-metre tower. During the operation, at about 1pm, an internal section of the tower collapsed, leaving one worker trapped on an upper floor.
A specialist team was still trying on Monday evening to rescue the man. “At the moment, there is a person trapped but we have evidence that he is still alive,” the Rome prefect, Lamberto Giannini, told reporters.
“Every effort is under way to try to save him, which is a priority, but what we can say is that it will be a very long and complex operation, because the risk of collapse is extremely high. We will try in every way because the absolute priority is to save this human life.”
Witnesses reported hearing a loud bang and seeing clouds of dust. One told Corriere della Sera: “I saw a worker fall.”
Firefighters flew a drone through a window to inspect the site.
One worker inside at the time of the first collapse said he escaped from a balcony. “It was not safe. I just want to go home,” said the man, white dust covering his uniform, who gave his name as Ottaviano and his age as 67.
Elena, from the UK, who like others did not want to give her last name, works at Shamrock, a pub with views of the tower from its outside seating area. She said she had been preparing to open the pub when the first collapse happened.
“It felt a bit like an earthquake,” she said. “I saw a man trying to get out by walking down the scaffolding – I didn’t realise people were inside working on it.”
She said people living in the apartments opposite rushed on to the street when they heard a loud bang and felt their building shake.
Sue and Don, a couple from the UK, had been having breakfast at a restaurant in front of the monument earlier in the morning when they heard loud drilling. “It seemed they were drilling deeply into the building and we wondered what they could be doing,” Sue said.
The couple then went to visit the Colosseum and when they returned the area was closed off and a rescue operation under way.
Caterina, who was born in the Italian capital, was among the large crowd of onlookers gathered at the scene. “I have never experienced anything like this in central Rome before,” she said. “It is centuries old and therefore a very important monument. Maybe something was hit during the works that destabilised the structure.”
Queen Paglinawan was working in a nearby gelato shop when she heard two loud noises in quick succession. “I was working and then I heard some like falling, and then I saw the tower collapse in a diagonal way,” said Paglinawan, 27, as yet another collapse occurred in the background.
Viktoria Braeu, 18, a student from Germany, passed by the scene just as the collapse during the firefighters’ rescue happened.
“We were just at the Colosseum … and we were just walking to get some food. And then we were like: ‘It’s probably not long until it’s going to go down,’ and then it just started erupting,” Braeu said.
The area of the Forum and Piazza Venezia, which is continuously packed with tourists and traffic, has been cordoned off. The mayor of Rome, Roberto Gualtieri, and Italy’s culture minister, Alessandro Giuli, were at the scene.
The Torre dei Conti was built in the 13th century by Richard Conti, brother of Pope Innocent III, as a fortified residence for his family. It was damaged in an earthquake in 1349 and there were collapses in the 17th century.
The restoration works are being financed by funds from the EU’s post-pandemic recovery fund in order to make the building more secure.
AFP, Reuters and the Associated Press contributed to this report
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