The death toll from the building collapse in Jordan’s capital Amman rose to 14 on Thursday after rescue teams recovered another body of a woman from the rubble.
The discovery was made as the search continues for survivors of the accident, the Public Security Department said. As well as the fatalities, 10 people were injured in the collapse.
Following his return from France on Wednesday, Jordan’s King Abdullah chaired a meeting at the National Center for Security and Crisis Management to keep abreast of the situation, the royal court said in a statement.
He urged that all those affected by the collapse of the residential building in Amman’s El-Luweibdeh neighborhood be provided with all necessary medical care and support, it said.
He also called for greater awareness of how to deal with old buildings, it added.
On a visit to the PSD on Thursday, the king praised the professionalism of the civil defense teams and stressed the need for more training and specialized equipment to deal with similar tragedies in the future, according to a separate statement from the royal court.
On Wednesday, Civil Defense Chief Hatem Jaber said that search and rescue operations would continue until all those believed to have been trapped were pulled out.
At least 25 people are thought to have been in the building when it collapsed on Tuesday. About 300 civil defense personnel are involved in the search and rescue mission.
Among those rescued so far are a five-month-old baby girl named Malak and a man in his 50s. The infant is currently being treated at the Luzmila Hospital in El-Luweibdeh, and is said to be in a fair condition.
Hussam Najdawi from the Greater Amman Municipality said the building that collapsed was nearly 50 years old, adding that the residents of four neighboring buildings had been evacuated as a safety precaution.
Technical teams from the municipality would assess the condition of several other old buildings in El-Luweibdeh, Najdawi said.
Although the GAM has been criticized for not taking care of old buildings it said it was not to blame for the collapse, which was the result of “irresponsible construction inside the property.”
GAM spokesperson Nasser Rahamneh told the government-owned Al-Mamlakah TV that the municipality’s job was organizational rather than technical.
The Jordanian Engineers Association said earlier it warned the GAM in 2017 about the deteriorating condition of several old buildings in Amman and called for urgent action to prevent them from collapsing.
Residents of the property that fell said its owner had been carrying out construction work on the ground floor which had weakened the support structure and caused cracks to appear in their apartments.
Local people told Arab News previously that developers had been building large residential units for foreign expatriates without “paying attention to the fact that the neighboring houses are very old and very fragile.”
El-Luweibdeh is a preferred neighborhood for expatriates in Jordan.
Following the collapse, the Amman prosecutor general opened an investigation into the incident and ordered the detention of the owner of the building, as well as its maintenance and technical contractors.
Rescue teams in the Jordanian capital Amman recovered the body of a woman from under the rubble of a collapsed building, raising the death toll from the incident on Tuesday to 14, according to local authorities.
The Public Security Department announced on Saturday the end of the search and rescue operation at the site, amid information that the woman whose body was recovered earlier this morning was the last on the list of missing people.
At least 25 people were thought to have been in the building when it collapsed, the government said.
The four-story residential building in Amman’s El-Luweibdeh neighborhood crumbled on Tuesday, killing 14 people and injuring 10 others, PSD said.
At least 350 civil defense rescuers had been working on removing concrete slabs and lifting debris in search of survivors, according to Civil Defense Chief Hatem Jaber, who described the effort as a “relentless operation that lasted for 85 hours.”
The Amman prosecutor general opened an investigation into the incident and ordered the detention of the owner of the building, as well as maintenance and technical contractors.
Residents of the property said that its owner had been carrying out construction work on the ground floor, which had weakened the support structure and caused cracks to appear inside apartments.
A resident of the building, who was on the street outside washing his car when the building collapsed, told government-owned Al-Mamlakah TV that “just one day” before the disaster, he had warned the building’s owner that the construction work was damaging his apartment on the first floor.
In sarcasm mixed with grief, the survivor said: “He (the building’s owner) told me that he would finish tomorrow and tomorrow he really finished us all.”
The Greater Amman Municipality said that the building was almost 50 years old.
Although the municipality had been criticized for allagedly ignoring safety concerns around older buildings, GAM said that it was not to blame for the collapse, which was the result of “irresponsible construction inside the property.”
Following his return from France last Wednesday, Jordan’s King Abdullah chaired a meeting at the National Center for Security and Crisis Management to keep abreast of the situation.
The king urged that all those affected by the collapse of the residential building be provided with the necessary medical care and support.
He also called for greater awareness of how to safely manage older buildings.
Hours before Jordanian rescue teams were approaching the end of their mission, criticism erupted on social media after a concert was held at the Roman Amphitheater, a venue that is relatively close to the site of the collapsed building.
Users on social media argued that it was inappropriate to hold a concert while the search for the missing was still ongoing.
The Jordanian government denied in statements to Al Arabiya that it had any connection to the concert, saying the event was organized by a private company. It also noted that Amman’s Municipality had nothing to do with the concert.
