ANGELES CITY, (Philippines): Emergency officials said late on Monday (May 25) they had ended a two-day rescue operation for at least 12 people believed buried in the debris of a collapsed building in the northern Philippines.
The bodies of four people, including a Malaysian man and two trapped construction workers, have so far been pulled from the debris of the nine-storey condominium project that collapsed onto a nearby hotel in the city of Angeles north of Manila early on Sunday.
There had been hope earlier on Monday when thermal sensors detected what rescue officials described as "signs of life" in one area of the wreckage. However, no survivors or further bodies were subsequently found, regional fire bureau spokeswoman Maria Leah Sajili said.
The rescue operation was formally declared over on Monday night and the search was suspended overnight before "retrieval operations" begin on Tuesday, she told reporters.
The Malaysian man, who was a guest in the hotel, and the two construction workers were all found trapped but alive on Sunday.
However, all three died before they could be pulled from the rubble.
The fourth confirmed fatality has not yet been identified.
Seventeen people had originally been listed as missing but rescue officials said one of them contacted officials on Monday to confirm he had not been in the area at the time, Sajili said.
She said that most of the remaining 16 were construction workers who were sleeping at the site at the time.
Officials said up to 70 people were employed at the construction site, although most had gone home for the weekend.
Alfredo Albis, 55, told AFP he believed two of his cousins who worked with him at the building site were among the missing.
"They were working here to earn for their families," said Albis, who was asleep at a nearby barracks for workers when the structure collapsed.
- Lack of safety gear -
The cause of the collapse is not yet known, but regulators had been monitoring the project.
Labour department inspectors shut the site down briefly in September 2024 over occupational safety standards violations, regional labour department official Geraldine Panlilio said on Monday.
"Our labour inspectors had monitored poor working conditions, a violation that would put our workers at risk," Panlilio said in an interview on Manila radio station DZMM.
Its workers "lacked safety gear" such as hard hats, boots, safety belts and lifelines, and worked under poor lighting and with no visible safety signage, she said.
Construction resumed a month after the shutdown when the contractor complied with safety requirements, Panlilio said. - AFP
