14 floors of tower under construction collapse

14 floors of tower under construction collapse
TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Bangalore: Tower ‘C’ of Prestige Shantiniketan, a township project on a 105-acre campus in Whitefield, came down crashing on Thursday evening. All the 14 floors of a portion of the tower collapsed. Six workers were injured.
Around 4.20 pm, one corner of the roof started to give in. Six floors of the block crashed subsequently; the entire portion collapsed within the next half hour. About 60 workers working on the rooftop, removing the centring structure, ran to safety when the crash occurred.
Fire force joint director B G Chengappa said the exact reason for the crash had to be ascertained by structural engineers.
Prestige Group chairman Irfan Razack said there were no casualties, nor was any worker injured. IJM, a Malaysian infrastructure company, were the contractors for the project. Asked about the cause of the crash, he said: “We believe a concrete slab that was being laid fell, and that then had a cascading effect. While I don’t think there’s any structural problem, we will evaluate all possibilities that could have led to this.”
The fire force could not launch a full-fledged rescue operation for two and a half hours because of the gradual collapse. Even after all the 14 floors had crashed, raising a cloud of cement, rescue could not begin because of reduced visibility. Light evening showers further delayed the process. Later, the fire force abandoned the operation following assurances from the promoters that there were no workers in the building at the time of the crash.
A project officer from the Prestige Group informed the police that one person was missing. Six workers who were at the bottom of the tower sustained injuries. They were taken to Vaidehi Hospital. 6 labourers injured BUILDING CRASH IN WHITEFIELD
Bangalore: Six labourers injured in the Prestige building collapse were admitted to Vydehi Hospital in Whitefield. Most sustained multiple injuries.
Srinivas, a labourer who suffered a leg injury, said he was working on the ground floor when the collapse occurred. Though he ran out, his left leg was hurt. “I could not see what the others were doing. I just ran out,’’ he said from the hospital bed.
Doctors said that all the injured workers were out of danger. Most of the labourers are from Orissa and Bihar. Dashrath, who was also on the ground floor, sustained severe leg injuries when he tried to escape. Dashrath is being operated upon.
M P Singh suffered mild injuries as he narrowly escaped the collapse.
Contractor to submit report: Prestige
The Prestige Group said the incident occurred an hour after the 14th-floor slab was cast by contractors IJM, Malaysia, an international construction company. “At 5 pm, the shuttering carrying the fresh, unset concrete collapsed, putting pressure on a small portion of the 13th floor and, in turn, on all lower floors. This resulted in about 4,000 sqft of slabs coming down. The superstructure is intact and there are no casualties,” the company’s vice-president, Nayeem Noor, said in a release.
Noor says the contractors immediately evacuated and cordoned off the area. “On verification from all contractors and agencies and their conducting a head count, it is confirmed that there is no injury or casualty. IJM has assured us there is no damage to the structure and they will carry out structural stability tests as a matter of caution. They have also been requested to submit a report on why this portion of the slab came down,” the release said.