Foreign Office supporting family of UK couple who died in Italy cable car crash

The UK Foreign Office has said it is supporting the family of a couple who were killed in a cable car crash in Naples.

Graeme Winn, 65, and Elaine Winn, 58, were among four people who died on Thursday at Monte Faito in the town of Castellammare di Stabia, near Naples in southern Italy.

The car that had crashed was ascending the mountain when a traction cable snapped.

It brought cable cars to a halt, including another near the foot of the peak that had 16 people onboard, who were evacuated.

The other victims were Janan Suliman, a 25-year-old Arab woman with Israeli citizenship. Her brother Thaeb Suliman, 23, was hospitalised in Ponticelli with severe injuries.

The fourth person who died was the cable car operator, named locally as Carmine Parlato.

Prosecutors in the Torre Annunziata region have opened an investigation into possible manslaughter charges after the crash about 28 miles (45km) south-east of Naples.

A Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office spokesperson said: “We are supporting the families of a British couple who have died in Italy and are in touch with the local authorities.”

Italian media reported that one of the cables supporting the cabin had snapped. The cable car service, which had opened for the spring and summer season 10 days earlier, underwent a maintenance check a week ago, according to reports on Friday.

“The cabin at the top has crashed,” Umberto De Gregorio, the chair of EAV, the public transport company that runs the cable car service, wrote on Facebook, calling it “a tragedy”.

A British tourist witnessed the evacuation effort from the cable car that was left suspended in the air after the traction cable snapped.

Megan Pacey, 50, from London, was with her husband, James Ross, and their children Hannah, 10, and Luke, eight, when they saw the car which had stopped in-mid air.

She said: “We were within a minute or two of [the incident] happening.

“They started winching people down from the cable car. We watched the first couple of people come down in a harness and as we left, there was a sense of urgency that had kicked in.”

She said she saw flowers and candles on the steps outside the railway station on Friday and emergency services remained at the scene.