A 35-year-old man was killed and his partner was seriously injured when they fell 20 meters into an open well north of the Netanya interchange on Route 2 on Saturday morning, Jpost reported.
The couple apparently fell into the old water well after entering an abandoned building during the hike.
At approximately 7 a.m., a policeman who was patrolling in the area spotted their car, which was parked near the abandoned building, Channel 2 reported. The car aroused his suspicion and he began searching the structure, where he discovered the couple.
The man was critically injured from the fall and succumbed to his injuries shortly afterward. Magen David Adom teams pronounced his death at the scene.
The woman, in her thirties, was evacuated to Hillel Yaffe Hospital in Hadera in serious condition.
The couple were not carrying any identifying documents, but a restaurant receipt found on their body suggested they had been stuck in the well for several hours before they were found, a MDA medic told Israel Radio.
Police launched an investigation into the accident. Israel Radio reported that the Emek Hefer regional council may be accused of negligence, as the council includes the well and the abandoned building in its jurisdiction.
According to the report, the well was last used during the British Mandate period in the 1930s.
In August, a five-year-old Palestinian girl died after she fell eight meters into an open well in the village of al-Jib, northwest of Jerusalem.
Firefighters called to the scene couldn't locate the girl in the dark well, and she was eventually rescued, some 30 minutes after falling, by scuba diving instructor Felix Lotan.
In July, a three-year-old girl whose family recently immigrated to Israel from the US was killed after she fell into a manhole that was filled with poisonous fumes in Jerusalem's Ramat Eshkol neighborhood.
The girl died shortly after inhaling the gas.
A middle-aged haredi passerby who jumped in the manhole in an attempt to rescue the girl was himself seriously injured and rendered unconscious.
