At least two people were killed and 17 were injured — including seven children — when a three-story building collapsed Wednesday in New York, as rescue teams work to locate possible missing people.
New York Fire Department (FDNY) Chief Lillian Bonsignore said at a news conference that four of the injured are in critical condition, 12 are stable, and the remaining one is a firefighter with minor injuries.
But she warned that “there may be more people (trapped) as this operation continues”.
The building, in the Brooklyn borough, came down around 4 p.m. local time (9 p.m. GMT) with several residents inside and collapsed into an adjacent building under construction, trapping several people who were in it.
Bonsignore said the rescue operation “is going to be long”, and added that more than 250 emergency personnel are deployed in the area, along with a canine unit.
The cause of the collapse remains under investigation.
Images posted on social media by firefighters show a large pile of debris that emergency crews are trying to clear with the help of excavators.
Brooklyn saw another similar tragedy last Thursday, when six people died and nine others were injured in a dramatic fire that tore through a three-story home in the Sunset Park neighborhood.
Source: EFE.