Lisbon, Portugal (AP) – Portuguese officials focused on establishing the cause of crash on Thursday Lisbon Tram It was popular with tourists who killed 16 people and injured 21 people, five of whom became serious.
“Cities need answers,” Lisbon Mayor Carlos Modus said in a televised statement. Wednesday’s derailment.
Known as Elevedor da Gloria and a huge attraction for tourists who packed Portuguese capital during the summer season, the downtown streetcars emerged from the rails during the evening rush hour. The crumpled wreckage was driven out as investigators sifted through the wreckage, took photos and pulled up metal cables from under the rails as they climbed one of Lisbon’s steep hills.
Police, prosecutors and government transport experts are investigating the cause, Prime Minister Louis Montenegro said he was standing next to the mayor. Carris, the company that operates tram services, said it has also launched its own investigation. He said scheduled maintenance was carried out.
Similarly, the mayor said he would seek investigations from outside independents.
Electric trams, technically known as performance, are utilized with steel cables, and descending vehicles help to help lift other vehicles with their weight. The car can carry over 40 people and sits standing there.
Authorities declined to comment on whether the brakes were broken or whether snapped cables prompted a downward tram Careen to the building A place where a steep road turns.
The story of the possible causes is “just speculation,” mayor Modus said.
The government’s air and rail accident investigation office said it will work with other agencies to issue a preliminary statement on Friday after finding the reason for the tram crash.
Lisbon’s Civil Protection Agency said Thursday that the death toll rose to 17. It later corrected it to 16 people and said it was lapsed due to duplicate information available.
All the deaths were adults, Margarida Castro Martins, Lisbon’s Civil Protection Agency Commissioner, told reporters. She did not provide their name or nationality.
The injured were men and women between the ages of 24 and 65, as well as three-year-old children, she said.
The injured included Portuguese, two Germans, two Spanish and one from France, Italy, Switzerland, Canada, Morocco, South Korea and Cape, she said.
The range of nationality reflects the size of the famous 19th century streetcars for tourists. Locals also generally use streetcars, with trams slopes of 18%.
Portugal observed a national day of mourning on Thursday after the worst disaster in the capital in recent history.
“This tragedy… crosses our borders,” Prime Minister Montenegro said in his official residence. He called it “one of our biggest tragedy of recent past.”
British tourists heard “a scary crash”
TV cameras record a site where a tourist street tram derailed and crashed in Lisbon, Portugal on Thursday, September 4th, 2025 (AP Photo/Armando Franca)
Felicity Feritor, a 70-year-old British tourist, arrived with her husband at a hotel near the crash site and unpacked her suitcase when she heard the “terrifying crash.”
“We heard that, we heard the bang,” she told the Associated Press outside the hotel.
The couple saw the tram when they arrived and were planning to board the next day.
“It was to be one of the highlights of our holiday,” she said. “It could have been us.”
She said emergency response was “surprising.” Police and ambulances were “inundated” soon, she said.
Italian tourists will never ride again
Francesca di Bello, a 23-year-old tourist from Italy who took a vacation in Lisbon with his family, was in Elevedor da Gloria just hours before the derailment.
They walked by the crash site on Thursday and expressed shock at the wreckage. Asked if she would be riding sex again in Portugal or elsewhere, Di Bello was highlighted. “No doubt,” she said.
Authorities did not give details about the people killed, but the traffic workers union said that streetcar breakman Andre Marquez was among the dead.
One of the big tourists in Lisbon is depicted
The 19th century trams are popular for short, picturesque trips, hundreds of metres up and down one of the steep hills of the city.
The team of pathologists from the National Institute of Forensic Medicine, strengthened by colleagues from three other Portuguese cities, worked all night at an autopsy that was expected to close early Thursday, officials said. The injured were admitted to several hospitals in the Lisbon area.
The emergency team works on a derailed electric tram site in Lisbon, Portugal on Wednesday, September 3, 2025 (AP Photo/Armando Franca)
“It hit the building with brutal force and fell apart like a cardboard box,” witness Teresa Dabo told Portuguese television channel SIC. She described the tram as out of control, saying it looked like there was no brakes and saw passersby bump into the nearby Freedom Avenidada Freedom, or the city’s main avenue.
Emergency officials said all the victims were pulled from the wreckage in just two hours.
Service stopped when inspection was ordered
Started in 1885, the service runs between Restaurant Door Square and the Bailo Alto district, famous for its nightlife. Elevador Da Gloria is classified as a national monument.
Lisbon’s city council has halted three other famous open-pit miners in the city while immediate inspections were being conducted.
Lisbon hosted around 8.5 million tourists last year, and people of long people were usually formed due to short rides on popular streetcars.
Tourists pack Gloria’s funcular, who arrived from downtown Lisbon on August 17, 2023, in the Bailo Alto, or in the High Quarter (AP Photo/Armando Franca, File)
The European Union flag of the European Parliament and the European Commission in Brussels flew at half price. Several EU leaders have expressed their sadness on social media.
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Hernán Muñoz contributed to this report.
