Tel Aviv building collapse: police close junctions as search continues

Update, 14 October, 12:07 Israel time

Police have closed several junctions around the site of the partial collapse to traffic. A Ynet alert said police had shut the intersections near the building, without naming them.

N12, carrying a police statement and photograph, listed the closed junctions as Herzl and Ahad Ha'am, Nahalat Binyamin and Montefiore, and Rothschild and Nahalat Binyamin. According to that report, officers from the Lev Tel Aviv police station, which covers the city centre, remain at the scene, taking part in the search effort and directing traffic. Police asked the public to follow officers' instructions and to use other routes.

The N12 report describes the search as continuing, which is in line with the Israel Hayom account that responders were still checking the site for anyone who might be trapped. Neither of the new reports gives any information on casualties, on the condition of the people earlier reported rescued, or on how the account of workers leaving before the collapse fits with the earlier reports of people pulled from the rubble.

The list of closed junctions spans both of the locations given in earlier reporting: the Rothschild Boulevard corner cited by most outlets and the Ahad Ha'am area named by Israel Hayom. Neither new report says how long the roads are expected to stay closed.

Update, 14 October, 11:07 Israel time

The Tel Aviv municipality said the building that collapsed had been designated for demolition, according to a Ynet alert. No further detail on the planned works was given.

The fire and rescue service told Ynet that 5 workers had left the building before it came down. N12 correspondent Yolan Cohen reported the same figure of 5 workers getting out ahead of the collapse, and said no casualties had been reported so far. Neither report explains how this account relates to the earlier reports of three people being pulled from the rubble, and the two descriptions have not been reconciled.

The response has also widened. Ynet reported that Home Front Command rescue units, the military's civil defence and search arm, were sent to the scene, and a later Ynet alert said dozens of residents had been moved out of neighbouring buildings.

Israel Hayom said responders were still searching the unoccupied site for anyone else who might be trapped. It gave the location as the junction of Ahad Ha'am and Nahalat Binyamin streets, rather than the Rothschild Boulevard corner cited in other reports, and described the building as residential.

The story as first reported

Part of a building undergoing renovation collapsed on Wednesday morning at the corner of Nahalat Binyamin Street and Rothschild Boulevard in Tel Aviv. Magen David Adom said its dispatch centre in the Dan region received the call at 09:37, and that in the first stage no casualties had been located while crews searched the site to make sure nobody was trapped.

Within roughly half an hour the picture changed. Haaretz reported that emergency services had pulled three people out from under the rubble. N12, citing the fire and rescue service, said the 3 people freed from the building were apparently construction workers.

How the rescue unfolded

The first reports, carried by several outlets in the minutes after the call, were cautious. Ynet said the building was not occupied while the works were under way and that the cause of the collapse was being examined. N12 reported that both the police and Magen David Adom said no injuries had been reported so far and that searches of the site were continuing. The Jerusalem Post likewise described police and paramedics scanning the scene for anyone trapped.

Those searches are what turned up the three people. Ynet's alert channel and N12 both then reported that the trapped individuals had been brought out. None of the reports describes how long the rescue took or what equipment was used.

The organisations involved

Magen David Adom, often shortened to MDA, is Israel's national emergency medical and ambulance service, a member of the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement. Its emergency number is 101, and calls are handled by regional dispatch centres. The Dan region, named after the area's historic designation, covers Tel Aviv and the surrounding metropolitan cities.

Search and extraction from collapsed structures in Israel is primarily the work of the national fire and rescue service, which is why the confirmation that the three had been freed came from that body, while MDA's role was to locate and treat casualties.

Where it happened

Nahalat Binyamin is one of Tel Aviv's older streets, known for its pedestrian section and weekly arts and crafts market. It runs into Rothschild Boulevard, a long, tree-lined avenue that is among the city's best known addresses and is lined with historic buildings, many of them in the international modernist style for which the city is recognised. The area is a mix of residences, offices, cafes and buildings undergoing restoration or conversion.

The reports describe the location differently. The Times of Israel placed the building on Nahalat Binyamin at the corner of Rothschild Boulevard, and Haaretz described it as central Tel Aviv, while early alerts from Ynet and News.co.il referred to southern Tel Aviv. All of them agree on the intersection itself.

What is not yet known

The reports leave several questions open:

• The condition of the three people who were rescued. No report says whether they were injured, or how seriously, or whether any were taken to hospital.
• Their identities. N12 described them as apparently construction workers, attributing this to the fire and rescue service, but that has not been confirmed in the other reports.
• Why the structure gave way. Ynet said the circumstances were under examination; no report names a cause, a contractor or the nature of the renovation work.
• How much of the building came down. The reports say only that part of it collapsed.
• Whether any official inquiry has been opened, by the police or by municipal authorities.

Initial statements that no one had been hurt or trapped were superseded once rescuers reached the three people under the debris. Readers should treat the early reports of no casualties as reflecting the situation before the searches were complete.