Istanbul — Officials said that rescue workers were making unremitting efforts to reach two people trapped under the rubble of a collapsed residential building in central Türkiye on Saturday, while three others had already been rescued. No deaths were reported.
The collapse comes as there is renewed focus on building safety after 78 people were killed in a hotel fire on Tuesday.
Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said 79 people were registered as living in the four-storey residential building in the city of Konya, about 260 kilometers south of the capital, Ankara.
Television images showed emergency workers sifting through a large pile of rubble on Saturday morning after the building collapsed on Friday evening.
Yerlikaya said that those who remained under the rubble were Syrian citizens, adding that the cause of the building’s collapse was not immediately known. “If there is a mistake, negligence or anything else, we will learn it together,” he told reporters.
The accident occurred just three days after A A fire broke out in a 12-storey hotel at a ski resort Northwestern Türkiye, killing 78 people. The fire investigation examines whether appropriate fire prevention measures were taken.
Questions about construction safety resurfaced two weeks before the war’s second anniversary An earthquake strikes southern Türkiye and northern SyriaMore than 59,000 were killed. The high death toll was partly due to disregard for building safety regulations.
In 2004, a 12-storey residential building collapsed in Konya, killing 92 people and injuring about 30 others. Structural defects and neglect were blamed for the collapse.
https://s.abcnews.com/images/US/abc_news_default_2000x2000_update_16x9_992.jpg
2025-01-25 06:53:00