Four people died and 13 were injured — two of them seriously — when a building collapsed in Stellenbosch on Monday afternoon, rescue workers said.
Stellenbosch municipal fire brigade chief of operations Tasso Steyn said construction workers were busy renovating the old, two-storey KWV wine cellar at about 2pm when the first floor collapsed, trapping workers.
Six people were taken to hospital, two of them suffering serious injuries. Another seven sustained minor injuries.
Of the injured, one worker had been pinned at his right elbow between a windowsill and the floor and was freed by rescue workers. Another man lost fingers on his right hand, said Steyn.
All the injured were employed by the construction company renovating the building and all were men, said Steyn.
One of the bodies had been recovered from the rubble, he said. It was found quite close to one of the exits.
Three other bodies remained under the rubble when the recovery efforts were called off as the site had been deemed unsafe, said ER24 spokesperson Nico Grobler.
”The rest of the building is busy leaning to the right-hand side and falling over,” he said.
Rescue workers were waiting for a structural engineer to come and make an assessment.
Grobler said the men had been working on the ground floor when the cement ceiling above them collapsed. The building was situated in an industrial park in Onder-Papegaaiberg.
”This was one of the last remaining structures that still needed to be renovated,” said Steyn. — Sapa