Restaurant collapses during birthday

Rescue efforts ended at a two-story restaurant in a northern Chinese village that collapsed during a local resident’s 80th birthday celebration, leaving 29 people dead.

The ministry of emergency management said yesterday that another 28 people were injured, seven of them seriously, when the building suddenly crumbled on Saturday.

There was no immediate word on what caused the collapse or on the fate of the birthday guest and other celebrants.

Hundreds of rescue workers using sniffer dogs, cranes and high-tech sensors had searched the rubble, lifting slabs of concrete in hopes of freeing survivors.

The China Daily newspaper said the cabinet’s work safety commission would oversee the investigation into the accident’s cause.