Rescue crews have continued to search for survivors in the rubble of a collapsed building in Brooklyn, New York, as the death toll rose to eight.
Six people were found dead in the wreckage and two others died later from their injuries, according to city officials. Two of those killed were children and another two have been identified as construction workers from a nearby site.
At least an additional 18 people were hurt when the three-storey residential building on the edge of a construction site in New York City’s Flatbush neighbourhood collapsed at about 4pm on Wednesday. Of the 18 injured, four were firefighters who led the rescue effort.
Zohran Mamdani, the mayor of New York City, said in a post on X on Thursday morning that he was “heartbroken” by the tragedy. He urged the public to stay away from the site on Flatbush Avenue, where about 250 first responders from the New York City fire department (FDNY) worked through what Mamdani said were “extremely dangerous conditions” to find anybody still trapped.
Speaking as torrential rain drenched the area, Mamdani said the weather would hinder but not stop the search.
“Conditions will get more challenging today with the rain, but operations will continue,” he said.
The New York fire commissioner, Lillian Bonsignore, said crews were still searching for survivors Thursday afternoon.
“We have not shifted from rescue to recovery,” Bonsignore said. “We are still in the search and rescue phase.”
“We always assume there are more people there until we can access the ground,” Bonsignore said. “So until we remove some of the bigger debris and are able to search beneath them, this will remain a rescue operation.”
Thursday afternoon, the FDNY said rescue workers had finished searching the collapse site as of 3.37pm local time after they determined there were no remaining victims. The site was then turned over to the New York police department (NYPD) and the city’s department of buildings.
Workers brought in an excavator in the early hours of Thursday to help move larger pieces of wreckage from the building, which had housed a number of apartments. Drones and canine units were being used to assist the rescue effort.
Video taken at the scene on Wednesday night showed crews removing several people on stretchers. One person, seen covered in dust, was extricated at about 6.30pm after a crew dug a hole through some of the debris.
Another person rescued was a woman who was six months pregnant, whose husband had been searching for her through the late afternoon, New York ABC News affiliate WABC reported.
“I have an update. She is alive, she is still alive. I am very happy,” the man told the outlet.
Dozens of onlookers, some in tears, gathered to watch the rescue operation. Lillian Bonsignore, the FDNY commissioner, told a crowd at an evening press conference: “We know that we are not finished here, and we will likely not be finished for quite some time.”
Adding to the urgency of the situation was a weather forecast that predicted heavy rain with a chance of thunderstorms and gusty winds moving through the borough from lunchtime and through Thursday afternoon.
Several people who were made homeless by the collapse took shelter in the Bethesda church of God in Christ opposite the site.
Kathy Hochul, the New York governor, called the collapse “absolutely heartbreaking” on Thursday morning at a press conference on a small business initiative in Harlem.
“I want to assure you city officials are leading the investigation,” Hochul said in a statement. “New Yorkers are stunned by what they’re seeing, but the investigators are already at work. And New Yorkers deserve to know how and why this happened. They’ll get to the bottom of it. And we will make sure that we support them in any way.”
The building that collapsed was perched at the edge of a lot where another one-storey building had been torn down for a construction project. The site was being excavated and the building that fell down filled the construction pit with bricks and wood.
Another building that shared a wall with the collapsed structure remained standing, but its wall was shorn off, exposing the rooms inside, including a bedroom and closets filled with clothing.
Investigators from New York City’s department of buildings were at the scene beginning an investigation into the cause of the collapse.
News channel NY1 reported that the department had recorded several issues with a project next door to the collapsed building in May, including working while there was a stop work order, not having proper overhead protection for the neighbouring properties, and failing to conform to approved construction drawings.
The city’s department of housing, preservation and development has recorded almost 100 violations at the collapsed building dating to 1972, NY1 said.
Property records show the building as a three-storey construction containing four residential units and one commercial unit.
The Associated Press contributed reporting
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