Emergency crews pulled three more bodies from the rubble of a collapsed building in the Jordanian capital on Wednesday, raising the death toll to nine, officials said.
Hundreds of rescue workers have been scouring the site of the four-story residential building in Jabal Al Weibda, one of Oman’s oldest neighborhoods, since it collapsed on Tuesday.
Rescue teams recovered three bodies from the rubble on Wednesday evening, a police statement said, bringing the death toll to nine.
He added that they were still “working hard to reach the remaining stranded people”.
A four-month-old baby and a 45-year-old man were rescued by rescue workers among 16 people injured in the tragedy, a security official told AFP on condition of anonymity.
Government spokesperson Faisal Shabul called the operation to find the missing persons difficult.
Shabul said that the area is rough, the buildings are close to each other and the corridor is narrow, which makes the search difficult.
According to state television, King Abdullah II arrived in Oman from a visit to France and headed to the kingdom’s crisis center to lead rescue efforts.
Jordanian Public Prosecutor Hassan al-Abdallat ordered the arrest of three people as part of an investigation into the crash, state news agency Petra reported.
Petra added that the three were said to be the manager of the building as well as two others who were involved in the maintenance work that was done on the structure.
Distraught relatives waited at the scene of the disaster in the city of Amman as emergency services, aided by sniffer dogs, worked to pull any survivors from the rubble.
Rescue workers, some working manually, were able to communicate with at least three trapped people, according to a witness who spoke on condition of anonymity.
- ‘Will not rest’ –
Hatim Jaber, head of the Civil Defense Service, said more than 350 emergency workers have participated in the search and rescue operation.
Rescue teams “will not rest” until all are accounted for, he said.
Yet Jaber declined to provide an estimate of the number of people still trapped, with Shabul previously putting the number at 10.
“There is no exact number of people trapped,” Jaber said, adding that “one person we pulled out thought his daughter was trapped under the rubble and later found out that the building is out of.”
King Abdullah had earlier pointed to the “importance of providing all the necessities for those injured and stepping up efforts to reduce the damage caused by the disaster.”
An AFP correspondent said the site was cordoned off on Wednesday morning and police had barred the public from accessing it to avoid disrupting the operation.
The site of the disaster is in the capital’s central district of Jabal al-Waybada, known for its vibrant cultural life and home to large numbers of immigrants.
Prime Minister Bashir Al Khasawna and several government ministers inspected the scene on Tuesday.
“One of the reasons the building collapsed is that it is old and dilapidated,” Jordanian Deputy Prime Minister Tawfiq Kirshan told state television.
