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04 September1965
Cableway
Author
Sante Rudatis
Format
8mm
Credits
Music & sound design by Lorenzo Valdesalici

On 4 September 1965, the Rudatis family is on holiday in San Vito di Cadore, in the Dolomites. The weather is fine and so why not try to climb up to the Lagazuoi refuge by the brand new cable car that links the Falzarego pass, 2,100 metres, with the newly inaugurated Lagazuoi refuge, almost at 2,800. The ascent and the view from the hut over numerous Dolomite peaks cannot escape the eye of the 8mm camera. And portraying high altitudes for tourists who do not climb but are carried is no trivial matter. The first cable cars for public transport date back to the turn of the century, but those experienced by the Rudatis are the years in which mass tourism is appearing in the Alps. As far as a means of locomotion reaches the tourist, everything seems so easy now, getting close to the sky no longer seems to be a privilege of the very few. However, cable cars are not without their pitfalls, the nightmare of sheared cables and of finding oneself suspended or even falling, accompanies the history of this means of transport. As would happen twenty years later, in 1987 to be precise, to the Lagazuoi cable car when a military aircraft sheared the traction cable, blocking its travel without causing the cabin to fall. Fortunately, the safety systems worked perfectly. Fright aside, one can continue to admire the views from above.

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