Firefighters battling blaze are killed as 17-storey building in Tehran collapses
At least 30 firefighters are reported to have been killed when a burning building in the capital of Iran collapsed.
Another 75 people were injured when the disaster struck the 17-storey Plasco building in central Tehran, just north of the capital’s bazaar, state media reported.
Firefighters, soldiers and other emergency responders dug through the rubble, looking for survivors.
Iran’s state-run Press TV announced the firefighters’ deaths, without giving a source for the information. Local Iranian state television said 30 civilians were injured in the disaster, while the state-run IRNA news agency said 45 firefighters had been injured.
Firefighters battled the blaze for several hours before the collapse. The fire appeared to be most intense in the building’s upper floors before the collapse. Those floors were home to garment workshops.
Police tried to keep out shopkeepers and others wanting to rush back in to collect their valuables.
Tehran’s mayor, Mohammad Bagher Ghalibaf, said there were “no ordinary civilians” trapped under the rubble. However, witnesses said some people had slipped through the police cordon and gone back into the building.
IRNA reported that Iranian President Hassan Rouhani ordered interior minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli to investigate and report the cause of the incident as soon as possible.
He also ordered the ministry to take care of the injured and take immediate action to compensate those affected by the disaster.
The building came down in a matter of seconds, shown live on state television, which had begun an interview with a journalist at the scene.
A side of the building came down first, tumbling perilously close to a firefighter perched on a ladder and spraying water on the blaze.
A thick plume of brown smoke rose over the site after the collapse.
Among those watching the disaster unfold was Masoumeh Kazemi, who said she rushed to the building as her two sons and a brother had jobs in the garment workshops occupying the upper floors of the high-rise.
“I do not know where they are now,” she said, crying.