06/09/2025
06/09/2025
LISBON, Portugal, Sept 6, (AP): Police in Portugal said Friday that 11 of the 16 people killed when a streetcar derailed were foreigners, as an initial investigative report examining what caused the popular Lisbon tourist attraction to crash was delayed by a day. The dead included five Portuguese nationals, three British citizens, two Canadians, two South Koreans, one American, one French, one Swiss and one Ukrainian, police said in a statement.
A German man also thought to have died in Wednesday’s crash was found to be in a Lisbon hospital, police said. It didn't provide an explanation for the error. The list of nationalities was published following forensic identification. The distinctive yellow-and-white Elevador da Gloria, which is classified as a national monument, was packed with locals and international tourists Wednesday evening when it came off its rails.
Sixteen people were killed and 21 others were injured. Multiple agencies are investigating what Prime Minister Luis Montenegro has described as "one of the biggest tragedies of our recent past.” The government’s Office for Air and Rail Accident Investigations said that it has concluded its analysis of the wreckage and would issue a preliminary technical report Friday.
But late in the day it informed Portugal's national news agency Lusa that the report would be published only on Saturday due to delays in carrying out procedures in conjunction with other bodies. It wasn't clear how revealing its initial report would be. Chief police investigator Nelson Oliveira said that a preliminary police report, which has a broader scope, is expected within 45 days.
The streetcar's wreckage was removed from the scene overnight and placed in police custody. A woman who was a French-Canadian dual citizen is among the dead, the French Foreign Ministry said Friday. The transport workers’ trade union SITRA said the streetcar’s brakeman, André Marques, was among the dead.
A national Portuguese charitable organization, Santa Casa da Misericórdia, whose main Lisbon headquarters are at the top of the hill where the streetcar runs, said four of its staff were killed. Spaniards, Israelis, Portuguese, Brazilians, Italians and French people were injured, the executive director of Portugal’s National Health Service, Álvaro Santos, said.