One killed, ten injured and hundreds stranded in the air overnight after cable car accident in Turkey

One person has been killed and ten injured after a cable car pod hit a pole and burst open in southern Turkey, sending the passengers plummeting to the ground below.

60 people were also left hanging in the air overnight after after the entire cable car system came to a standstill yesterday (Friday April 12), the interior ministry said this morning, (Saturday April 13). Two children were among the injured in the accident at the Tunektepe cable car outside the Mediterranean city of Antalya, which occurred at about 6pm during the busy Eid al-Fitr holiday, the state-run Anadolu Agency said.

Anadolu identified the dead man as a 54-year-old Turk. Some of the injured were ferried off the mountain by helicopter and efforts continued to remove the other injured people, interior minister Ali Yerlikaya said three hours after the accident. The rescue operation involved more than 160 first responders including air crews from the Coast Guard and mountaineering teams from different parts of Turkey, the minister posted on social media site X.

Some 184 other passengers were trapped in 25 other cable car pods dozens of feet above the ground as engineers tried to restart the system, Antalya Mayor Muhittin Bocek said. Helicopters with night vision imaging were sent to the scene.

Search and rescue agency AFAD later said 49 people had been rescued from the suspended pods, leaving 135 still stranded close to midnight — about six hours after the accident. Images in Turkish media showed the battered car swaying from dislodged cables on the side of the rocky mountain as medics tended the wounded.

But by this morning (Saturday), 16 hours later, more than 60 people were still stranded in nine cabins, the ministry said. None of the people waiting to be rescued had critical injuries or were in poor health, Disaster and Emergency Management Authority chairman Okay Memis told reporters at the scene.

A video released by the interior ministry showed rescue personnel tied to safety ropes climbing into cabins. They hope to complete the rescue work before sunset on Saturday. It initially reported seven people had been injured in the collision, but the number was later revised to 10 by health minister Dr Fahrettin Koca.

Mr Koca wrote on X: "One person died and 10 people were injured as a result of a cable car cabin falling in Antalya's Konyaaltı district. May God have mercy on our citizen who lost his life in the accident, I wish a speedy recovery to our injured, and I wish a speedy recovery to the rescued and waiting to be rescued victims."

Friday (April 12) was the final day of a three-day public holiday in Turkey marking the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which sees families flock to coastal resorts. The cable car carries tourists from Konyaalti beach to a restaurant and viewing platform at the summit of the 618m (2,010ft) Tunektepe peak. It is run by Antalya Metropolitan Municipality.

Antalya Chief Public Prosecutor’s Office has launched an investigation. An expert commission including mechanical and electrical engineers and health and safety experts was assigned to determine the cause of the incident.