On January 8th at 9:10 p.m. on ORF 2
Vienna (OTS) – Christoph Feurstein will present the following contributions in “Thema” on Monday, January 8, 2024, at 9:10 p.m. on ORF 2:
Fire in Graz restaurant – how people were able to save themselves
“You hear people screaming, see the flames and just think: For God’s sake, how many are still in there?” says Silvia Weinhandl. The Styrian woman was with her husband and friends in the Stern Bar in Graz on New Year’s Eve when she suddenly saw fire in the entrance area just a few meters away. The group is able to escape through the front door of the restaurant, only moments later the path is blocked by flames. “I intuitively broke the windows with armchairs from the outside in order to be able to save people,” reports her husband Thomas Weinhandl. Any help comes too late for a 21-year-old from Lower Austria; she dies in the fire. Of the 21 injured, three require treatment in the intensive care unit. Savanka Schwarz reports for “Thema” on the status of the investigation and has the fire department explain to her how to behave in an emergency.
Cut Off Village – The Fight of the Forgotten People
Anyone who lives in Guntschach needs strong nerves. In December 2022, a rock fall destroyed the only road that leads to the small town in the municipality of Maria Rain in Carinthia. Since then, the people of Guntschach have been virtually cut off from the environment. Without a road, there is no car connection, “and therefore no post office, no garbage collection, no cultivation of the fields, no medical care,” say desperate residents. The paths to “civilization” lead through the forest – or you are lucky and the private pedestrian ferry is in operation, taking people across the Drau to the other bank. As a result, many families have left their homes and moved to emergency accommodation. Work on a new road began last October, but no one dares say how long it will take. “If a celebrity or a lawyer lived here, we would already have a connection,” they say behind closed doors. Sonja Hochecker goes on a local inspection in a place that feels abandoned by the authorities.
Bullying – those affected talk about their daily torment and how to cope with it
“I loved my job. Just as a violinist has to play the violin, a surgeon has to operate.” Adelheid End worked in her dream job in a large hospital in Vienna. As a woman in a male-dominated world, it wasn’t easy for her right from the start. “I was systematically excluded from the surgical department,” says the pensioner. She fought against it for eight years, including in court. Then she was released from duty. “I had to throw up in the morning because I was afraid of school,” says Clemens Ebinger. At the age of eight, he was regularly beaten, mocked and had books thrown at him in elementary school. Other children in his class are also bullied. “The teachers were watching,” says the now 26-year-old. Bullying is often difficult to combat. Only if criminally relevant actions are taken during the bullying can legal action be taken against it, reports Leon Hoffmann-Ostenhof.