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 * Dead link
 * - Aftermath
 * Four of the five men charged with causing death by negligence in the Maccabiah bridge collapse eight months ago pleaded innocent at Tel Aviv Magistrate's Court yesterday.

One by one Yehoshua Ben-Ezra and Baruch Kargula, the owners of the contracting company that built the bridge; Adam Mishori, manager of the subcontractor Irgunit; and Yoram Eyal, the chairman of the games organizing committee who has since resigned, pleaded not guilty.

The fifth defendant, Micha Bar-Ilan, the engineer who designed the bridge, is expected to enter a plea of innocent at the end of the month.

The bridge collapse killed four Australian athletes and injured more than 60.

The five defendants are charged with negligent homicide and building without proper permits. Ben-Ezra, Kargula, and Mishori were also charged with violating the Contractors Registration Law.

The session ended after less than an hour, with defense attorneys asking the court to instruct prosecutor Hadas Forrer-Gafni to explain or include in the indictment the cause of the collapse.

Attorney Avraham Landstein, representing Bar-Ilan, said that if the reason for the collapse is not known, one can not accuse five people of negligence.

"I say that a person can be negligent, but this negligence is not the cause of the collapse. Someone else's negligence led to the collapse," said Landstein.

In reaction, Forrer-Gafni said there is no obligation in the law to detail the cause of the death in the indictment.

"There are a number of reasons for the collapse of the bridge, each one of the causes could have separately led to the collapse," she said.

Judge Edna Beckenstein instructed Forrer-Gafni to submit in writing the causes of the deaths within seven days.

The footbridge collapsed under the Australian delegation as it crossed on its way into the National Stadium for the games' opening ceremony on July 14. The Australian athletes fell into the polluted waters of the Yarkon River. The bridge was built especially for the event.

On leaving the court-room one of the contractors, Kargula, said "We accurately followed the engineers' instructions."

The contractors intend to base their defense on arguments that Eyal's oversights and foul-ups are to blame for the collapse of the bridge and that the polluted waters of the Yarkon River are the cause of the deaths.

The next court session is scheduled for March 29 when Bar-Ilan will enter a plea. The trial will then be adjourned until May 18, after which hearings will be held three times a week.
 * - Doesn't have much information
 * - Aftermath, Knesset investigation, compensation, MWU resignations, memorials, Yarkon pollution, etc. Good information
 * - Yarkon River pollution. Connects it to bridge tragedy.
 * - Aftermath
 * - Aftermath and quotes
 * - Good info on trial and pollution. Casual drinking of the water of the Yarkon River poses no health hazard, senior Sheba Hospital microbiologist Dr. Natan Keller testified yesterday at the trial of the five men accused of responsibility for the Maccabiah bridge disaster.

Four Australian athletes died and dozens were injured when the bridge buckled during the opening ceremony of the Maccabiah Games last July 14.

Keller added that the illness suffered by those who fell into the river when the bridge collapsed was caused by a fungal infection. The fungus, he said, is present mainly in the mud on the river bottom, which was stirred up by the collapse of the bridge and the large numbers of bodies thrashing about in the water.

Keller was testifying as a prosecution witness, apparently to rebut claims that the fungal pollution in the river was the main cause of the deaths of the four athletes. His testimony allowed the prosecution to argue that the pollution was only a secondary cause, and the bridge collapse was the primary cause.

Meanwhile, the attorney for Yoram Eyal, who was chairman of the Maccabiah organizing committee at the time of the games, and is one of those charged with negligence, questioned why police were not held accountable for the collapse.

"The approvals {for the bridge} were signed by all the appropriate authorities, including the engineer, the fire service, and the police, yet police accountability was never properly investigated," said attorney Dov Weisglass.

Some 100 Australian athletes were on the foot bridge when it collapsed and a policeman has testified that he was told to limit the number of people crossing to 150.

A second lawyer, Avraham Landstein, who represents engineer Micha Bar-Ilan, who designed the bridge, asked chief police investigator Amiram Omer why he did not look into reports that a police vehicle was seen on the bridge the day before it collapsed.

"I did not think it appropriate to investigate police responsibility for the bridge collapse," Omer answered.
 * - Aftermath. Memorial. Requested resignations. Quotes.
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 * - Aftermath; lawsuits; compensation
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 * - Criminal trial and Elterman aftermath
 * - Criminal trial; lawsuits; Eyal apology
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 * - Israeli reaction and legacy. Quotes.
 * - Dotan commission report findings.
 * - Everything. Good info.
 * - Collapse itself. I seem to have used all the useful information from this article.
 * - Good info on river pollution and search for cause of fatalities. Warren Zines, the Australian athlete who lapsed into critical condition last week following injuries sustained in the Maccabiah bridge collapse, died yesterday, raising the death toll from the July 14 accident to four.

His death intensifies the debate over pollution in the Yarkon River, into which Zines and his teammates fell when the bridge collapsed.

Zines, 56, was a member of the Australian lawn bowling team. He died of a severe respiratory-tract infection, according to Sheba Hospital spokeswoman Rachel Sofer.

His wife Lynne, daughter Lisa, and son Adam were at his bedside. His condition had improved a day after his admission three weeks ago, but it deteriorated soon after, and he went into a coma from severe respiratory insufficiency. Doctors said the high bacterial count in the Yarkon water that he inhaled made it impossible to stabilize his condition.

His body was transferred to the Institute of Forensic Medicine at Abu Kabir for an autopsy.

"We deeply regret there is yet another death in this terrible episode," said Australian Ambassador Ian Wilcox.

While there is still no medical evidence that contaminants in the Yarkon contributed to the four deaths, Wilcox said that he had urged Israel to speed up the tests it is conducting. "It looks as though {Zines'} death is linked to toxins in the water. It was clearly not just a drowning," said Wilcox.

Two of the four athletes were killed immediately when the footbridge carrying the Australian athletes across the river collapsed. A third died subsequently of lung and kidney complications that hospital officials attributed to pesticides in the water.

While Sofer could not say whether Zines' death was similarly linked to pesticides, Yona Tennenbaum, of the National Coroner's Office, said that "there is a connection between the deaths and the state of the water, although the exact relationship has yet to be determined."

The Yarkon River has already been tested for contamination by dangerous levels of heavy metals, originally suspected as one cause of the Australians' ailments. However, lab tests found that the river did not contain enough radioactive matter to harm humans. Labs in California are now testing water samples for noxious organic matter.

Meanwhile, questions have been raised about the use of mosquito oil sprayed into the river shortly before the bridge collapsed. But Dr. Yeshayahu Bar-Or, head of the water department of the Environment Ministry, said that tests have shown that the oil was present in low concentrations only, and was environmentally friendly.

More worrying are unidentified hydrocarbons which have also been found in the water. Speaking of the Australian athletes, Bar-Or said: "It should be noted that at least part of their symptoms are those of people who inhale hydrocarbons."

Zines's death leaves alive only one Australian victim hospitalized here: Sacha Elterman, 15. Elterman is still suffering in from severe lung damage, cause unknown, and underwent a lung biopsy last week.
 * - Aftermath; memorial; quotes. Only a little info.
 * - Pollution; Israeli reaction. Good article.
 * - Pollution.
 * - Investigations; Israeli reaction; legacy; commentary; quotes. Excellent info.

Suggested outline

 * Intro
 * Background
 * Collapse
 * Infections
 * Initial investigations
 * Criminal trial
 * Australian reaction
 * Pollution in Israel
 * Israeli reaction and legacy
 * Memorials