The Gazette | “Ugly noise”, says driver who rescued doctor who fell into crater in Cachoeiro

Driver Geraldo Mussi was passing along Avenida Francisco Lacerda de Aguiar, in Cachoeiro de Itapemirim, when he saw doctor Eurípedes Fernandes de Melo being “swallowed” by a crater that opened on a sidewalk in the Gilberto Machado neighborhood. One of the first to help rescue the victim, the resident says the noise was frightening.

“It was an ugly noise. The train fell, it was all on top of him. I went down to get it. We helped take it off, the other guy came and helped me take it off because it was very heavy. I alone couldn’t handle it. We lifted it, placed a prop and took it out”, reported the driver, in an interview with reporter Gustavo Ribeiro, from TV Gazeta Sul.

The doctor was rescued in an ambulance and taken to a nearby hospital. “He was asking for help because the stone on top of him was very heavy. […] When the hole sank and the stone fell on top of him, we just came running here and took away the stones so as not to let him suffocate with the water and the heavy stone that was on top of him”, says Geraldo.

The crater that opened is about two meters high. The victim’s son, Alberto Soeiro, informed the reporter that his father is lucid, but had a fractured femur and underwent surgery on Monday afternoon.

The information was confirmed by Unimed Sul Capixaba, in the early evening of this Monday (1). According to the Hospital, the doctor underwent surgery and definitive surgery on the femur with the inclusion of a rod was performed, with the patient lucid and oriented.

According to lawyer Arthur Buteri, son of the owners of the house where the wall opened, the sidewalk had no signs of problems.

“On Sunday I came here because the gate stopped working. At first, we even thought it was a technical problem, so much so that we called the people who do electrical maintenance for today because from the outside everything seemed real. There was no indication that this could happen,” he reported.

Broken sidewalk may have been caused by tree roots, points out CREA-ES (Cachoeiro City Hall)

• According to Crea-ES (Regional Engineering and Agronomy Council of Espírito Santo), a rupture was identified in the drainage network in the region, probably caused by the roots of a tree.
• Despite this, the BRK company, which provides sanitation services in the city, says that a technical team was on site and found that the accident was not related to the water and sewage networks operated by the concessionaire.
• But the coordinator of Municipal Civil Defense, Inácio Daroz, explains that the sidewalk gave way due to lack of support. He did not give many details, but believes that the accident could have been caused by rainwater, which would have left the sidewalk and wall ‘suspended’.
• A Cachoeiro City Hall reinforces that preliminary information points to the possibility that the drainage network has been deteriorated due to time, as it has existed for more than 30 years. “A study is being carried out and there is no way to say yet that the existing tree at the site was responsible for the damage to the network”, he explained.
• A water and sewage concessionaire (BKR) was contacted again by the report with the information passed on by Crea-ES and Cachoeiro City Hall, but the company again stated that the accident is not related to the pipes. “The water supply and sewage collection networks in that section operate regularly, without any damage”, he guaranteed.

*With information from reporter Gustavo Ribeiro

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