Brooklyn building collapse kills eight as city reviews construction site next door

Eight people were killed Wednesday in Brooklyn's Flatbush neighborhood when a three-story building gave way and fell into a pit being dug on the lot beside it, according to Associated Press stories published by PBS NewsHour and KSAT. City officials said the dead included a 9-year-old and a 10-year-old, and that 18 people were hurt, four of them firefighters, PBS NewsHour reported.

Records cited by PBS NewsHour show the structure held a street-level commercial space with four apartments upstairs. Crews called off the search for victims Thursday after working through the wreckage for over a day.

Mamadou Mouctar Balde was out running errands when the building fell, ABC7 New York reported. Two men who lived with him, Mamadou N'Diaye, 31, and Mamadou Barry, 23, were killed. ABC7 described the pair as his cousins, while the AP called them roommates. His wife, Fatoumata Bah, who is six months pregnant, was rescued and is in stable condition at Kings County Hospital, the station said. Balde said the baby is also fine.

Mayor Zohran Mamdani said the remaining victims had roots in Mexico, Colombia, Ecuador and Trinidad, according to PBS NewsHour.

Neighbors told the AP that vibrations from the construction had shaken their homes and left cracks in their walls. A man who works across the street said he saw bricks dropping from the building minutes before it went down.

Mamdani said inspectors are being sent to over 160 locations tied to six entities associated with the adjacent demolition and excavation project, and that an independent engineering firm will prepare a report, the AP reported. He said the city would act on "any evidence of criminality" turned up by investigators. No charges have been reported.

The Department of Buildings halted the demolition in March over a lack of overhead protection, and in April found that crews had restarted despite the order, the AP reported. Buildings Commissioner Ahmed Tigani said the job was later permitted to go on once the issues were fixed. In September, a contractor informed the city that digging, including rock blasting, was about to start.

The project's general contractor was named in two lawsuits tied to 2016 projects that alleged it damaged neighboring properties, according to the AP. The company denied the claims in one case, and its owner did not answer the AP's requests for comment. City records also show the collapsed building had more than 90 unresolved housing code violations, some dating back to the 1970s.

Council members urged the city to fill open jobs at the Buildings Department, where roughly 9% of authorized positions sit vacant. "Grief without accountability is not enough," said Council Member Farah Louis, as reported by KSAT.

Compiled by True News from reporting by ABC7 New York, KSAT, News4JAX and PBS NewsHour. Each outlet's original story is linked below.

Originally published by True News: https://truenews.bagleyenterprises.net/stories/1053