Italy nightclub stampede: Six people killed and more than 50 injured following incident in Ancona

Police investigating reports stampede sparked by pepper spray

Italian fire and rescue service treating victims after a stampede at a nightclub in Cornaldo (AFP/Getty Images)

Five teenagers were among six people killed and 53 injured during a stampede in an Italian nightclub.

Panic spread through the crowd after someone sprayed an irritant at around 1am, according to reports which have not yet been confirmed by investigators.

Italy’s interior minister Matteo Salvini said that it could have been ammonia while rapper Sfera Ebbasta, who was due to perform at the event, said it was pepper spray.

The victims were three girls and two boys aged between 14 and 16 and a 39-year-old mother-of-four, Eleanora Girolimini, who had accompanied her 11-year-old daughter to the disco.

Their bodies were found near a low wall inside the building in Corinaldo, near Ancona, on the central Adriatic coast, fire service spokesman Dino Poggiali told Sky TG24 News.

Thirteen of the injured were in a very serious condition.

Prime minister Giuseppe Conte, who visited the scene, said “the government must ask itself what to do so that such tragedies must never happen again.”

Authorities said organisers sold 1,400 tickets for the disco but only one room was used and it was only capable of holding 469 people.

Some survivors were quoted by local media as saying at least one fire exit was blocked when concertgoers tried to get out.

Mr Poggiali said all the doors were open when rescuers arrived although it was too early in the investigation to know if safety violations might have played a part.

He added that two parapets had apparently fallen down during the stampede.

Firefighters had concentrated on giving first aid to survivors, stretched out on the road outside the club, before starting their investigation, he said.

Ms Girolimini’s husband Paolo lashed out at the organisers outside the hospital where the bodies were taken following the stampede.

“Four children now are without their mother,” he said. “It was way overcrowded and alcohol abounded.” He said his 11-year-old daughter was being treated for a knee injury.

Mr Ebbasta wrote on Twitter that he was “deeply pained” by the tragedy and said that he wanted everyone “to stop and think how dangerous and stupid it is to use pepper spray in a discotheque”.

Italian president Sergio Mattarella demanded a full investigation and Mr Salvini vowed to bring to justice “whoever out of nastiness, stupidity or greed transformed an evening of partying into tragedy”.

At the Vatican, Pope Francis bowed his head in silent prayer after he told 30,000 pilgrims and tourists in St. Peter’s Square that he was praying “for the young people and the mamma” as well as for the many injured at the concert.

Additional reporting by Associated Press