Cervia (Ravenna) – The scale of the tragedy was realized by two boys who, passing by the street, noticed the pool gates open. They entered for a swim and, when they approached the water, they saw something floating. “I thought it was a doll”, one of them later told the investigators. But it was a little girl: Magdalena Kaiser, just four years old. Their screams attracted the first rescuers. A doctor rushed down from one of the hotel rooms. But there was nothing more to be done for the girl: no pulse, no sign of life in her eyes.
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Magdalena, who would have turned years old on October 20, had arrived from Austria to Milano Marittima, on the Ravenna coast, to spend a holiday with her parents and her two older sisters. Her childhood dreams ended around 2 p.m. inside the ’Continental’ hotel on IX traversa. The 118 operators tried until the last moment to resuscitate her even inside the ambulance.
All in vain: she was declared dead around 4 p.m. at the ’Bufalini’ hospital in Cesena. On site, in addition to the carabinieri and colleagues from the Ravenna Investigative unit, the duty prosecutor Angela Scorza also arrived for an inspection lasting over two hours, after which the seizure of the pool was ordered. Several witnesses have already been heard to reconstruct a tragedy partly captured by security cameras. Clips show the girl going down towards the pool. Then follows a dead zone not covered by the cameras. From the images, it was possible to deduce that she remained in the water for at least 7-8 minutes: an endless time that would have left no chance to anyone.
According to checks, shortly after having lunch, the little girl was with her father, a long-time patron of that same hotel since he was a boy. The two were between a play area and the water feature. The father, after ordering his daughter to wait for him among the games as he would be back soon, left perhaps to go upstairs to get something, where the wife was with the other two daughters. When he came back down, the doctor was already attending to little Magdalena, now lifeless.
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An autopsy will be performed on the girl early this week: the first step to shed full light on what happened. It is inevitable that the Ravenna Prosecutor’s Office opens a file for manslaughter in which – at least hypothetically – both the father’s name and that of a couple of the facility’s managers could appear as a guarantee act. After all, according to initial reconstructions, the pool access gates were open even though the lifeguard service was not yet present at that time. Further checks will probably be ordered on safety protocols.
“Today we are struck by a tragedy that deeply marks our city – wrote the mayor of Cervia Mirko Boschetti on his Facebook profile before going personally to the hotel –. A girl of only four years lost her life in a tragic accident. In this moment of great pain, I wish to express my sincerest condolences to the parents and all the family members. It is difficult to find words that can ease the pain of such an immense loss, but on my own behalf and on behalf of the entire city, I express all possible closeness to the family members.”
