Tragedy on Passo del Bacio, between Camogli and San Fruttuoso: thirty-year-old falls 50 meters and dies

CAMOGLI (GE). Dramatic accident on the path between San Fruttuoso and Camogli. A man in his thirties fell while traveling a via ferrata on the Passo del Bacio and fell 50 meters below. Rescuers intervened on the spot alerted by the group of friends with whom the man was. The 118 personnel arrived aboard the Drago helicopter of the fire brigade but, unfortunately, the young man had already died also due to the difficulty of reaching the exact point of the fall. The thirty-year-old sadly passed away. His body is still found at the scene of the accident.

Carabinieri, firefighters, mountain rescue are operating on the spot. It seems from the first investigations that he lost his balance and then fell down the slope. The fall was then arrested by a tree. Rescue operations are still ongoing to recover the body. He still doesn’t know the person’s identity.

Meanwhile, the carabinieri have reached the people who were with the thirty-year-old on the path. It concerns a woman and a couple with whom the hiker was on a trip. I’m in a state of shock.

The restrictions yesterday from the Regional Park to secure the pass
Just yesterday the board of directors of the regional park had launched some restrictions for a stretch of path. By changing the access rules of one of the most panoramic points of the Portofino Park on the path which, from the Batterie, goes to San Fruttuoso passing through Cala dell’Oro and Costa del Termine. The new rules are the same as the use of the Via dei Tubi, the nineteenth-century aqueduct that supplied Camogli, where excursions can be made only if authorized by the Portofino Park Authority. This was decided by the board of directors of the Regional Park, with the presence of the president Matteo Viacava, the vice president Francesco Faccini and the councilors Francesco Olivari and Cesare De Francesco; absent Paolo Donadoni. The session was also attended by Paolo Corsiglia, president of the Community of the Park.

Already during the council meeting last February, the board of directors had expressed its intention to modify the fruition regulation for the Passo del Bacio, in light of the number of accidents that have occurred in recent years, in particular in 2022 and since the beginning of 2023. The modification the access methods will also make it possible to monitor – using the data provided by the eco-meters – the flow of hikers who frequent that stretch of path; by filling in a personal data sheet, it will be possible to obtain statistical data on the characteristics of the people who cross that section.

The new provisions will have to be accompanied by a greater and more significant supervisory activity both by the park rangers and park ranger assistants and by the voluntary associations that have entered into an agreement with the Park. The problem, which emerged and tackled by the board of directors, is not so much the difficulty of walking the stretch where Passo del Bacio is located as the conditions in which one arrives at that point: the path, in its entirety, is long (over 10 kilometers from San Rocco a Portofino), it is covered entirely under the sun and on the mountain, on the slope facing south, when hikers encounter high temperatures with a high level of humidity they perceive an unbearable level of heat.

The board also took note of the request made by the interim management committee of the national park to have the support of structures and tools to be able to operate. Depending on the requests of the committee, based on article 12 paragraph 3 of ministerial decree 332 of 2021 which instituted the perimeter with 11 Municipalities, the provisional management committee and the safeguard rules, and having read a communication sent by the management general of the Ministry of the Environment and Energy Security to the same committee on the opening of a dedicated expense account, the Regional Park, in the utmost spirit of collaboration between public bodies, has agreed to make its facilities available. As early as next week, the committee should be equipped with a Pec which will be sent to the 11 Municipalities to proceed with clearance and authorizations.