Five people were rescued from a collapsed building in China, authorities said Saturday after emergency teams overnight clawed through the rubble of a structure that housed a cinema and guesthouse. Authorities are yet to reveal how many people they believe are still buried underneath the six-storey building, which caved in on Friday afternoon in central Changsha city. No casualties have been reported so far, but an announcement by Changsha said that “search and rescue work is still urgently underway”. Building collapses are not uncommon in China, due to weak safety standards and corruption among officials tasked with enforcement. In January, an explosion triggered by a suspected gas leak brought down a building in the city of Chongqing, killing more than a dozen people.

Source: Punch April 30, 2022 10:43 UTC