The building, which includes a hotel, apartments and a movie theater, collapsed on Friday afternoon in Changsha City, Hunan Province, leaving an open hole in a densely populated street front. Another 39 people could not be reached after the incident, Changsha mayor said. It was not clear if the authorities believed that the people with whom communication was not possible were also under the rubble. “The situation of the missing is being further assessed,” said Mayor Zheng Jianxin. As of Saturday, city authorities have not yet provided details about the victims. However, officials said five people were rescued from the structure overnight. State media showed firefighters – backed by an excavator – cutting metal mud and concrete sheets, while rescuers shouted at the wreckage tower to contact any survivors. Crowds gathered as rescue chains removed pieces of brick by hand, allowing experts to dig deeper into the collapsed building. Some of the injured were rushed to a narrow alley late Friday, while scout dogs combed the area for further signs of life. No cause for the disaster has yet been given by authorities, although speculation has shifted to possible overcrowding on the property, which officials said was eight storeys high, correcting earlier reports that it was six. “Tenants had made structural changes to the facility to varying degrees,” state-run CCTV said, adding that the cause of the collapse was under investigation. Subscribe to the First Edition, our free daily newsletter – every morning at 7 p.m. BST President Xi Jinping called for “every sacrifice” to be made to investigate the victims, state media reported, adding that he had ordered a thorough investigation into the causes of the collapse. A top Communist Party official was sent to the scene earlier in the day to signal the severity of the disaster. State Adviser Wang Yong – appointed by the central government – was sent to lead a team to “lead the rescue and emergency work,” an official statement said Saturday. Building collapses are not uncommon in China, due to poor safety and construction standards as well as corruption among law enforcement officials. In January, an explosion caused by a suspected gas leak destroyed a building in Chongqing City, killing more than a dozen people. Twenty-five people also lost their lives in June 2021 when a gas explosion hit a residential area in Shiyan city. That same month, 18 people were killed and more injured when a fire broke out at a martial arts school, with state media reporting that all the victims were boarding school students.
