NAPLES – Four foreign tourists plunged to their deaths and a fifth person, possibly the cable car operator, was severely injured Thursday when a funicular railway carriage tumbled to earth after its cable snapped near the town of Faito close to the resort of Castellamare di Stabia in Naples province, firefighters said.

 The incident happened around 3 p.m., some two hours after the cable car was halted possibly by a power outtage. in thick fog before the cable broke. Eleven other tourists in another carriage were rescued by firemen when the security system blocked them a short distance from the lower start point of the railway.

The nationality and identity of the dead tourists was not immediately disclosed.

 The doomed cable car had left the top of the railway some 1200 M above sea level a short time before the system locked down. Attempts to rescue the trapped tourists by helicopter were hampered by the thick fog.

 The railway had been re-opened for the tourist season just a week ago after maintenance work. In 1960 another accident on the cable car plant caused four deaths and 31 injuries when a carriage slipped off its cable and tumbled down the mountain slope.

 In 2021 17 people were suspended in cars on the cable for an hour due to a power blackout before electricity was restored.