The Washington Post<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n
ROME \u2014<\/p>\n
In the darkness under tons of snow, the survivors reached for their only lifeline. From their phones, text messages were punched out to 112, the Italian emergency response number.<\/p>\n
\u201cHelp,\u201d one couple wrote after their hotel was buried in an earthquake-triggered avalanche, \u201cwe\u2019re dying of cold.\u201d<\/p>\n
But when rescuers on Thursday finally reached the resort \u2014 swallowed by a wall of white that roared down the Gran Sasso mountains in central Italy a day earlier \u2014 there was only silence from under the crush of snow, rocks and splintered fir trees.<\/p>\n
A handful of survivors waited in what was left of the Hotel Rigopiano. They included a man who was getting something from the family car just when the avalanche hit. Trapped below were his wife and two children. They were among up to 30 people listed as missing.<\/p>\n
At least three bodies were found Thursday, as hopes for the others trapped faded hour by hour.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are so many dead,\u201d Antonio Crocetta of the local alpine rescue workers told Italy\u2019s state-run news agency ANSA. \u201cThe avalanche was huge.\u201d<\/p>\n
Crews were \u201cworking nonstop through the night\u201d to clear roads and a space in front of the hotel for vehicles and search-and-rescue teams, said Carlo Torlontano, vice prefect of Pescara, a city about 30 miles east of the resort. He was noncommittal on hopes of finding survivors.<\/p>\n
It was a disaster whose proportions and aftermath were set by twin blows from nature \u2014 in a region still trying to recover from major quakes last summer that toppled centuries-old buildings and nearly wiped out some villages.<\/p>\n
The mountains of the Abruzzo region were battered by huge snowfall over the past days. Another storm hit Wednesday, dumping a fresh layer on the slopes. Then a series of moderate quakes was enough to unleash the deadly snow slide, experts say.<\/p>\n
The avalanche also blocked the only twisting road to the four-star spa and hotel, built in an alpine glen at nearly 4,000 feet.<\/p>\n
<\/i>Some rescuers used skis, and others were dropped by helicopter. The first rescue crews started to dig with shovels. Meanwhile, plows struggled to carve a route along the snow-choked access road to bring in heavy equipment.<\/p>\n
Images from the scene showed hallways choked with snow, which also punched into the hotel lobby and buried tall peaked roofs. A frosty mist that had settled over the area slowly began to lift.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe mist is easing now,\u201d said Pierpaolo Petrucci, a representative in the regional assembly. \u201cAnd when the mist dissipates, the ugliness appears.\u201d<\/p>\n
Among the survivors was Giampaolo Parete, 38, who told rescuers that he had gone to his car when the avalanche hit. His wife and two children were buried inside, ANSA reported.<\/p>\n
\u201cI saved myself because I\u2019d gone to pick something up from the car,\u201d he said. \u201cThe avalanche came and I was buried by snow, but I managed to get out. The car was not buried, so I stayed there and waited for rescue operators.\u201d<\/p>\n
Quintino Marcella, a restaurant owner, told the channel Sky TG24 that he received a call from one of his chefs, who was visiting the hotel. The chef escaped, but said his wife and two children were trapped inside.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe calls me and says, \u2018Help me, an avalanche has hit and the hotel isn\u2019t there anymore. It\u2019s disappeared. It\u2019s buried,\u2019\u00a0\u201d Marcella said.<\/p>\n
\u201cHelp, help, help, help,\u201d the chef cried to Marcella.<\/p>\n
The list of the missing included a young couple from Italy\u2019s eastern Marche region, another couple from the Abruzzo city of Chieti, and a family with a 7-year-old boy, Italian media reported.<\/p>\n
Ilario Lacchetta, mayor of the nearby town of Farindola, said the toll could have been much worse if it had been a weekend when more guests are normally at the hotel, which he called the \u201cjewel of the region\u2019s crown.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cLast Sunday, the Hotel Rigopiano had 200 guests, staff included \u2014 yesterday there were between 20 and 30 people, including some kids,\u201d Lacchetta told La Stampa newspaper.<\/p>\n
The earthquake-prone region was hit by at least three tremors around 5.7 magnitude Wednesday, prompting the avalanche. There have been heavy snowstorms throughout the area as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cAround here it does snow a lot, but not even the elderly can remember such a thing. If you add the snowstorm to the earthquake, you can understand how it all became difficult \u2014 we face two tragedies that could not have been foreseen,\u201d Lacchetta added.<\/p>\n
Primo di Nicola, editor of the local newspaper Il Centro, described some of the Abruzzo region as \u201cbasically offline,\u201d with roads blocked by snow and toppled trees. \u201cNo water, no power, inaccessible roads,\u201d he told The Washington Post.<\/p>\n
In some areas, Italian authorities opened police stations and military barracks for people without heat or electricity.<\/p>\n
Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni \u2014 facing criticism for the delays in reaching the hotel \u2014 blamed the recent \u201crecord snowfall\u201d and urged political leaders to \u201cmultiply their efforts\u201d to aid the Abruzzo region.<\/p>\n
Gian Gabriele Ori, a geological expert at the Gabriele d\u2019Annunzio University in Chieti, said the alpine forests in the region are normally enough to hold deep snow in place. But heavy snowfall and high winds in recent days probably had created a more unstable snow pack, he added.<\/p>\n
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\u201cThe earthquake was the spark that set in motion\u201d the avalanche, whose speed and force \u201ctoppled the forest and then [hit] the hotel with destructive power.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
Central Italy has been struck by several earthquakes since August, when the historic centers of many towns were leveled, killing 300. Substantial aftershocks also occurred in October.<\/p>\n
Schemm reported from Addis Ababa, Ethi\u00ado\u00adpia, and Murphy from Washington.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A rescue leader feared “many dead” as snow delayed rescue efforts in central Italian mountains. by Stefano Pitrelli, Paul Schemm and Brian Murphy, The Washington Post<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[65],"class_list":["post-1013","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-washpost","tag-terremoti"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1013","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1013"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1013\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1014,"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1013\/revisions\/1014"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1013"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1013"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stefanopitrelli.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1013"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}