Brooklyn apartment building collapse, Digi Mart USA News (Brooklyn, New York): A three-storey building in Brooklyn has collapsed, killing at least two people and leaving more than 10 others in hospital, New York City officials said, as rescuers searched the rubble for additional victims.
The four-unit apartment building, dating from 1930, collapsed and tumbled into an adjoining construction site where excavation work was under way. The cause of the collapse is under investigation, said John Esposito, the city’s fire department chief.
Officials said the number of people at home when the building in the Flatbush area collapsed about 4pm on Wednesday was not immediately known. They did not say how many workers were on the construction site at the time.
According to The New York Times, the building came down at the intersection of Bedford and Flatbush Avenues, shearing off the wall of an adjacent three-storey building and leaving a staircase, bedroom and closets exposed to the open air.
A firefighting crew that happened to be in the neighbourhood was on the scene within a minute of the collapse and helped pull the first victims from the debris, authorities told reporters at an evening press conference. Mayor Zohran Mamdani said at least two people were killed and more than 10 others were taken to local hospitals with critical and non-life-threatening injuries.
City Fire Department Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore said the overall number of known victims stood at 19 people, seven of them children. She declined to say whether the two dead were children or adults.
A firefighter also suffered minor injuries.
Local television footage showed rescue workers with search dogs combing through the ruins and removing debris in buckets, seeking signs of people who may have been trapped beneath the wreckage. New York television station WABC-TV reported that at least four survivors were pulled from the wreckage about two to two and a half hours after the collapse, including a pregnant woman.
Esposito said it would take rescue teams several days for the entire site to be “searched for all potential victims”, adding: “We do not know how many people are missing overall.” The fire department initially said four people were critically injured and six sustained minor injuries before the first two survivors were pulled from the debris.
