Dramatic pictures from the Sauerland: An entire house collapses due to an explosion. There are injured, buried and missing. A race against time begins.
After the house collapsed in Hemer, Sauerland, as a result of an explosion, a man was rescued from the rubble. Rescue workers first provided him with medical care on site and then wanted to take him to a clinic, the police said early Saturday morning.
At the same time, according to the information, the rescue of another person was being prepared. A third person was believed to be under the rubble. Emergency services could not initially contact her.
According to the latest information, there is already a victim with serious injuries in the hospital. Another person was rescued with minor injuries. Three of the eight residents of the house were probably not at home at the time of the collapse.
Aerial photos show a field of rubble where an apartment building was just standing. An explosion caused complete devastation in Hemer, Sauerland, on Friday evening. Four people were rescued injured, two are still trapped and buried under the rubble, but alive, according to a police spokeswoman.
Excavators and cranes in action
The salvage operation is a race against time. With heavy equipment in the form of excavators and cranes, the rubble has to be carefully cleared away piece by piece in order to get to the buried people.
The rescue workers don’t know exactly what to expect late Friday evening. You are preparing for a long night. Three residents are still missing. Maybe they traveled, maybe they had visitors.
The seriously injured is not in mortal danger. It was high up on the rubble mountain, reports fire brigade spokesman Andreas Schulte. Three other people escaped with minor injuries, which appears to be very fortunate given the extent of the destruction.
Difficult situation
The house is said to have been a six-party house with eight residents. “Unfortunately, it collapsed completely, there is not a single stone left standing,” says firefighter Andreas Schulte.
Now it is important to advance cautiously, but also quickly to the two buried victims. “We are in contact with the people, we talk to them and try to save them from the rubble,” Schulte told the news portal “Lokalstimme.de”.
Then, during the night, a doctor manages to get to one of the buried people. “He was able to provide her with medical care, but she has not yet been recovered,” says the police spokeswoman.
The detonation shattered the windows of neighboring houses. A structural engineer must now clarify how much the houses have gotten. The police spokeswoman says they will remain evacuated until then. The exact cause of the explosion is initially unclear, but the fire brigade and police report that it was a gas explosion.
The area around the accident site is cordoned off over a wide area. It is unclear how many people were in the house at the time of the accident. Hemer is a town with 34,000 inhabitants in the Märkisches Kreis in Sauerland. It is the eastern neighboring town of Iserlohn.
