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AUTHORITIES SAID CONDITIONS at a glacier in the Italian Alps were too unstable for searchers and dogs to work where a chunk of ice broke loose at the weekend, killing several hikers.
But with the aid of drones, two more bodies were spotted at the edge of tons of debris from the avalanche.
The discovery raised to nine the known death toll from Sunday’s avalanche, Trento Provincial President Maurizio Fugatti told reporters this evening in the resort town of Canazei, at the foot of the Marmolada glacier-topped mountain.
Five people who had been hiking have been unaccounted for. But authorities stressed that until identification can be made on the two bodies pinpointed by drones, it will not be clear if they number among those five whose families said they never returned from the mountain.
All of the missing are Italians. So far, four of the nine dead have been identified.
While hikers were enjoying a Sunday outing in warm, sunny weather, an enormous portion of the glacier detached, sending an avalanche of ice and rocks thundering across a main hiking trail.
Rescuers said they hoped the temperature would dip on Thursday, lessening the risk of more avalanches, so searchers could go on the Marmolada slope.
Relatives of the missing Italians pressed for the retrieval of their loved ones’ bodies, which are believed to be buried under the avalanche.
The size of the glacier’s detached pinnacle has been compared to an apartment building.
Trento Prosecutor Sandro Raimondi said in an interview on Italian state radio today that he opened a formal investigation to determine if any negligence was involved. Prosecutors plan to consult geologists.
But Raimondi said it appeared at this point that the avalanche could not have been anticipated.
“The unpredictability in this moment is the chief protagonist,” he said.
Forensic police investigators dispatched from the city of Parma took samples from some of the remains recovered to try to determine if they belonged to any of the people missing.
Meanwhile, the mayors of Canazei and smaller towns at the base of mountains in the Dolomite range issued ordinances closing off the Marmolada peak to hikers. Some people ignored the orders and scrambled up the lower slopes.
Authorities have cited a weeks-long heat wave in northern Italy and scant winter snowfall as likely factors in the weekend breakup of the glacier, which has dramatically shrank over decades.
Last weekend, the temperature on Marmolada topped 10C, unusually high for early summer, authorities said.
Polar sciences experts at an Italian government-run research centre estimated that the Marmolada glacier could disappear entirely in the next 25-30 years if current climatic trends continue.
Between 2004 and 2015, the glacier lost 30% of its volume and 22% of its area.
So what they’re saying is that the government bailed them out and they’re doing nothing with that money except for hoarding it and loaning to their buddies? What a total shocker. I never saw that coming.
Fair play to ISME for keeping this issue highlighted, many businesses are trying to keep going and even develop on cash flow knowing it is a time consuming and costly waste of time even applying for credit, business is being strangled and bled to death by government inaction on credit and high costs.
SMEs are possibly the worst exploiters of workers in Ireland. They flaunt labour laws, hide behind the likes of ISME and the SFA.
When it comes back buy a safe .
What?
No mention of the 90% of applicants told by bank staff not to bother applying for a loan?
Considering the banks were in such deep denial in 2008 it’s no wonder since the same cronies are still running the shop that they are hording cash. And whilst they continue to keep their bonuses, from the money we bailed them out with – the rest of the SME’s can sink – with us along with them. The business page of the Sunday Indo had the finest example of how the ‘enterprise challenged’ heads of BOI behave, letting a Jemie Jenkins business fold through lack of a credit line backed by letters of credit from his export customers – he had export orders worth thousands in the states for crying out loud! Just shows even when they promote enterprise week in may and dragons den they are apathetic to any economic need – other than the economy of their own pockets! – Pillar bank my ole!
Ye! forgot about that one – dead right Harry, I was one of them !
The banks are protecting themselves at the direct cost, not only to small and medium enterprises but to the whole economy. While this government waffles and dithers about bank interventions, SMEs are being terrorised and ultimately shut down by discredited bailed-out bankers, arrogant at top level and ignorant at branch level. With 96% of business owners of the opinion that Government have either a negative or no impact on SME lending, this Administration must act now and install active management into the banks, representing the owners, the taxpayers, to ensure honest reporting, sustainable reform and a return to proper banking.
http://paydayloansat.com/
Get your friends together and sign a petition. Bring that petition to your local TD’s, tell them that they need to confront the banks…all of the banks in your area, that you expect that your TD will write to the local banking institutions informing them that all of the signatories will take their money out of the bank, close their accounts and refuse to do business with them until they begin to loan to the SME sector again. You get 10 or 15 TD’s involved with that (and many TD’s would be delighted of the photo opportunity and to be seen on the side of the little guy) get some air time and a little public anger going and the threat that deposits might suddenly en masse start walking out the door…watch the little piggies squeal then!!
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