Kenyans assist in the rescue operation at the site of a collapsed building in Nairobi, yesterday. - REUTERS
NAIROBI (Reuters):
A BUILDING under construction collapsed in downtown Nairobi, yesterday, killing four people, injuring at least 70 and trapping many others under mounds of heavy debris.
Rescue workers and passersby in the busy commercial district dug frantically by hand through piles of concrete, steel and wood to recover the dead or reach screaming victims.
Ambulances sped from the scene with the injured while bulldozers and cranes worked to clear the wreckage, surrounded by a crowd of hundreds of onlookers police struggled to control.
"There are four confirmed dead," Kenya Red Cross Disaster Response Director Farid Abdulkadir said, adding that two people had been pulled out alive so far. "There are people trapped below and some are calling for help."
A Reuters cameraman saw three dead bodies at the scene. Another victim died after being brought to Kenyatta National Hospital, where the majority of the injured were taken.
"There are about 70 casualties and they're still coming in," Kenyatta spokesman Herman Wabwoba said, adding many were in critical or serious condition.
There was no immediate word on the cause of the collapse. Construction workers had been adding more floors when the building fell, and a Reuters reporter said some of the concrete was still wet.
"We were working and then I felt a tremor, like the one we felt the last time, and then the building just fell," said construction worker Patrick Otiyo, referring to a 6.8 magnitude earthquake that struck East Africa in December.
Otiyo, covered in dust and scrapes, escaped serious injury but was taken away to the hospital.
Kenyan police in a statement appealed to "members of the public and private sector who are trained in rescue operations to rush to the scene together with their machinery to assist."
2006-01-23 14:25:38 GMT (Reuters)
