A woman who had just given birth was killed moments later when a hospital elevator in Spain suddenly malfunctioned and cut her “in half,” according to a report.
Rocío Cortes Nunez, 26, was being taken on a stretcher to a third-floor maternity unit after waking up from a C-section at the Our Lady of Valme Hospital in Seville on Sunday afternoon, El Correro reported.
Her husband, José Gaspar, joined by other family members, was waiting for Nunez when he “heard a loud blow in the elevator,” he told the news outlet.
A hospital warden moving Nunez between floors had decided to change elevators after the doors opened and closed, but the lift didn’t move, the Mirror reported.
But as he started to remove the stretcher, the lift began its ascent, trapping the woman, according to the report.
Regional health minister Marina Alvarez called the incident “quick, unusual and tragic,” El Correro reported.
The accident was suspected to have been caused by a mechanical failure of the elevator’s door — but Alvarez told El Correro that the lift had “passed all the controls and complied with the regulations.”
Nunez’s baby girl was on her way to another hospital to receive treatment for a heart condition when her mother was killed, the Mirror reported.
Nunez had two other daughters, Carmen, 5, and Rocío, 4.
“They have killed my beautiful daughter, the joy of my life, and they’ve left three young girls without their mom,” Rocío’s father, Juan Manuel Cortés, told ABC Sevilla.
Nunez and Gaspar married about four years ago. Nunez was a housewife and Gaspar worked as a waiter, the station reported.
“This cannot be so,” Gaspar told the station. “Today it has been Rocío, but tomorrow [it] can be another person.”