"While a collapse like the one in Genoa is quite rare, there are about 15 to 20 bridges collapsing every year in the country", he said.

"When I heard it had collapsed, I was not surprised".

Matteo Pierami drove across the bridge with his wife and child, aged two months, nearly an hour before it collapsed.

This flexibility, the EU executive highlighted, allowed the country to invest more in the past few years "for instance in the development and maintenance of infrastructures", Christian Spahr, European Commission spokesperson told the press.

On Wednesday he called for Brussels to exclude safety spending from the Stability and Growth Pact - the budgetary rules that have governed Europe since the financial crisis.

Part of the Morandi bridge collapsed during a heavy storm in the northern port city on Tuesday, sending about 35 cars and several trucks plunging 45 metres onto railway tracks below.

She said: "We saw the pylon go completely to the right, and we realised what was happening".

The 55km stretch of the A10 accounts for around 1.7 per cent of total network traffic for Italy's biggest toll road operator, according to one analyst's estimate.

"Italy sorely needs higher and better public investments but they haven't been a priority for politicians in recent years", Piga said, noting that the previous administration had even appeared to divert some funds away from infrastructure after winning some budgetary leeway from Brussels for investments.

Rescuers inspect the rubble and wreckages by the Morandi motorway bridge after a section collapsed earlier in Genoa on August 14, 2018.

Genoa's chief prosecutor, Francesco Cozzi, said 10-20 people were still missing.

Tropiano is amazed that so many people survived the fall, and hoped others may still be found alive.

Italian interior minister Matteo Salvini declined to say how many people are feared missing, because a number of those involved were on holiday and so were not expected to return to their homes.

Italian emergency experts pulled two more bodies out of tons of broken concrete and twisted steel Wednesday after a highway bridge collapsed in Genoa, raising the death toll in the disaster to at least 39 people.

He also allocated five million euros for the smooth facilitation of search and rescue operations.

He also announced a national day of mourning would take place, which the government wanted "to coincide with the funerals of the victims".

The service will be held in a pavilion on the industrial city's fair grounds and led by Genoa's archbishop, Cardinal Angelo Bagnasco.

Toninelli, from the populist 5-Star Movement, threatened in a Facebook post that the state, if necessary, would take direct control of the highway contractor responsible for the bridge if it couldn't properly care for the roads and bridges it was responsible for.

Atlantia shares fell by as much as 25 per cent at one point after being indicated down in pre-open trade by as much as 50 per cent. Shares were later down around 22 per cent. The news agency ANSA said the theoretical drop was 21.4 percent, from Tuesday's close of 23.54 euros ($26.66). Outside experts will study the video to see if it might help determine the cause.

A large section of the Morandi viaduct upon which the A10 motorway runs collapsed in Genoa, Italy, on August 14, 2018.

Atlantia said the maintenance work was "approved by the transport ministry in accordance with the law and the terms of the concession agreement".

At one point in morning trading shares in its holding company, Atlantia, fell nearly 30% from the previous close.

Premier Giuseppe Conte said his government won't wait until prosecutors finish investigating the collapse to withdraw the concession from the main private company that maintains Italy's highways, Atlantia.

But the government has turned on Autostrade for the disaster, threatening it with heavy fines and demanding it contribute to the bridge's reconstruction though investigators have yet to identify the exact cause.