Eight killed, including two children, in Brooklyn apartment building collapse
Eight people died, two of them children, after a three-story building on Flatbush Avenue collapsed; rescue crews continue searching for survivors amid rain.
Eight people, including two children, were confirmed dead after a three-story apartment building at 1321 Flatbush Avenue in Brooklyn collapsed on Wednesday afternoon, officials said. The New York City Fire Department (FDNY) reported that six victims were pronounced dead at the scene and two died later in hospital, while 18 others were injured, including four firefighters.
FDNY Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore told reporters that crews remained in rescue mode more than 20 hours after the incident, saying, "We will be here until we are 100% sure there are no more people trapped. To be clear, we have not shifted from rescue to recovery. We are still in the search-and-rescue phase."
Mayor Zohran Mamdani, who visited hospitalized victims, described the event as a "very dark evening and morning for our city" and pledged that the Department of Buildings would investigate the collapse and related excavation work.
Rescue operations continued despite a rainstorm, with heavier excavation equipment slated for use on Thursday to clear larger debris. Bonsignore added, "We always assume that there are more people there until we can access the ground. So until we’ve removed some of the bigger, bigger debris and are able to search beneath them, this will remain a rescue operation."
The building, which housed a ground-floor business and two residential floors, was adjacent to an excavation site where a single-floor structure had been cleared. City officials said five entities were linked to the excavation project and that the Department of Buildings would conduct sweeps of related sites.
Utility crews shut off water mains to about 100 nearby buildings to facilitate rescue work, and several neighboring residences remained under vacate orders. Five bus routes were rerouted as traffic stayed closed on Flatbush Avenue between Clarendon Road and Bedford Avenue.
The cause of the collapse has not yet been determined, and a comprehensive investigation is underway.