Witnesses Recount Fatal Plummet of Lisbon Funicular, as Officials Seek Cause

The yellow and white funicular had made it just a few yards up a steep Lisbon, Portugal, hill on Wednesday evening, witnesses said, when it jerked to a stop and then began a short free-fall back to the starting block. People fell from their seats and on top of one another, causing injuries and chaos.

They were in the lucky carriage.

Just as suddenly, the car running on the parallel line and connected to the first carriage by a cable system began descending from near the top of the hill, accelerating to breakneck speed before crashing into a building, killing at least 16 people.

On Thursday, Lisbon was mourning and Portuguese authorities were searching for answers about what caused the crash of one of Lisbon’s most popular tourist attractions, the Elevador da Glória. Portugal’s prime minister called it “one of the greatest human tragedies in our recent history.”

Authorities opened an investigation into the accident on the vintage funicular, which carried passengers up and down a steep, scenic slope in the center of the hilly city. A local official said the dead included some foreigners, but the names of the victims have not been announced yet. At least 21 survivors were injured, authorities said.

The two cars of a funicular act as counterweights to each other, one climbing as the other descends, usually at a leisurely pace. The ride on the Elevador da Glória typically lasts a few minutes, as the carriage proceeds along the cobblestoned Glória walk, connecting the Bairro Alto neighborhood to the broad boulevard running through the heart of the city below.

The fact that both cars dropped fast and simultaneously caused speculation, including in local news media, that the underground cable connecting them had either come loose or broken, but government officials have not yet commented.

“The city needs answers,” Carlos Moedas, the mayor of Lisbon, said at a news conference Thursday, as the nation observed a day of mourning.

At the site of the crash, the roof of the carriage lay sideways Thursday beside a jumble of metal pieces and broken wooden seats.

Among the dead was the funicular’s driver, André Jorge Gonçalves Marques, the Portuguese transport workers union said in a Facebook post, as well as an American citizen, the U.S. State Department said.

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.