Portugal observes day of mourning after mishap involving famed Lisbon tram kills 15

Portugal observed a national day of mourning on Thursday, a day after a famous Lisbon streetcar (or tram) derailed and killed 15 people in the capital’s worst accident in recent history.

Authorities have given no information about those killed or the 23 that police said were injured in the accident, raising the initial casualty toll.

The 19th-century streetcar is one of Lisbon’s big tourist attractions and is usually packed with foreigners at this time of year for its short and picturesque trip up and down one of the city’s steep hills.

Teams of pathologists at the National Forensics Institute, reinforced by colleagues from three other Portuguese cities, worked through the night on autopsies, officials said. The injured were admitted to several hospitals in the Lisbon region.

The streetcar's crumpled wreckage was still on the downtown road where it crashed on Thursday, cordoned off by police. Accident investigators were due at the scene. Officials declined to speculate on whether a faulty brake or a snapped cable may have caused the accident.

Police officers inspect the site where a tourist tram derailed and crashed in Lisbon, on Thursday. Associated Press

The yellow-and-white streetcar, known as Elevador da Gloria, was lying on its side on the narrow road that it travels on, its sides and top crumpled. It crashed into a building where the road bends, leaving parts of the mostly metal vehicle crushed.

Hit building with 'brutal force'

"It hit the building with brutal force and fell apart like a cardboard box,” Teresa d’Avó told Portuguese TV channel SIC. She described the streetcar as out of control and seeming to have no brakes, and said she watched passersby run into the middle of the nearby Avenida da Liberdade, or Freedom Avenue, the city’s main thoroughfare.

The accident occurred at the start of the evening rush hour, around 6pm local time. Emergency officials said all victims were pulled out of the wreckage in just over two hours.

The streetcar, technically called a funicular, is harnessed by steel cables and can carry more than 40 people, seated and standing. It is also commonly used by Lisbon residents.

The service, inaugurated in 1885, goes up and down a few hundred metres (yards) of a hill on a curved, traffic-free road in tandem with one going the opposite way.

Lisbon’s City Council halted operations of three other famous funicular streetcars in the city while immediate inspections were carried out.

The Elevador da Gloria is classified as a national monument.

Lisbon hosted around 8.5 million tourists last year, and long lines of people typically form for the brief rides on the popular streetcar.

Carris, the company that operates the streetcar, said scheduled maintenance had been carried out. It offered its deepest condolences to the victims and their families in a social media post, and promised that all due diligence would be taken in finding the causes of the accident.

Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa offered his condolences to affected families, and Lisbon Mayor Carlos Moedas said the city was in mourning. "It’s a tragedy of the like we’ve never seen,” Moedas said.

Portugal’s government announced that a day of national mourning would be observed on Thursday.

"A tragic accident ... caused the irreparable loss of human life, which left in mourning their families and dismayed the whole country,” it said in a statement.

Associated Press