Israeli woman among 4 killed in southern Italy cable car accident

A cable car carrying tourists south of Naples crashed to the ground Thursday after a cable snapped, killing at least four people, including an Israeli, and critically injuring one, officials said.

One of the four fatalities is an Israeli woman identified by the media as 25-year-old Janan Suliman from Mashhad in northern Israel.

A second Israeli was rescued from the crash site and remains in critical condition. The identity of the wounded Israeli has not been confirmed, although Hebrew media reported that he is Suliman’s brother.

Two of the other victims were British, with one of them identified by British press as Margaret Elaine Winn, 58. The second has yet to be identified. The fourth victim of the crash was 59-year-old cable car operator Carmine Parlato.

The snapped cable brought both the upward and downward-going cable cars to a halt as they traversed Monte Faito in the town of Castellammare di Stabia. The upward cable car eventually crashed, causing the fatalities and injury, while eight tourists and an operator were evacuated from the downward cable car, Naples Prefect Michele de Bari said.

“The traction cable broke. The emergency brake downstream worked, but evidently not the one on the cabin that was entering the station,” said Castellammare Mayor Luigi Vicinanza.

ג'נאן סלימאן, בת 25 ממשהד שבגליל התחתון, היא הישראלית שנהרגה בתאונת הרכבל באיטליהhttps://t.co/d7ocBtYYGM pic.twitter.com/21KuQpXnR9

— החדשות – N12 (@N12News) April 18, 2025

Italy’s alpine rescue, along with firefighters, police and civil protection services responded to the accident.

The accident occurred just a week after the cable car, popular for its views of Mount Vesuvius and the Bay of Naples, reopened for the season.

“The cable-car reopened 10 days ago with all the required safety conditions,” said Umberto de Gregorio, head of the cable car company.”What happened today is an unimaginable, unforeseeable tragedy.”

Italian Premier Giorgia Meloni expressed her condolences for the victims and their families and said she was in touch with rescuers. She was in Washington, where she met with US President Donald Trump.

The cable car has been operating since 1952 and a similar accident in 1960 also left four dead.

In May 2021, a cable car crashed in the Italian Alps near Lake Maggiore, killing 14 people, including 5 Israelis, with a young boy from the family the sole survivor and ultimately the subject of a bitter international custody dispute. In 1998, a US fighter jet flying at a low level on a training flight cut a steel cable and 20 people in a cable car in the Dolomites were killed.