After a Building Collapse in South Africa, 11 Workers Were Found Alive Beneath the Rubble

Rescue teams in South Africa have discovered 11 workers trapped under a collapsed building, officials said Tuesday, May 7.

One man managed to call his wife from beneath the rubble, the five-story building that had been under construction when it collapsed on Monday, which helped rescuers locate him Fear and Uncertainty grip the city.

Six workers have been confirmed dead, and there are fears that the death toll will rise significantly. There is no word on the 37 other people who remain missing amid the massive slabs of concrete and metal scaffolding that came crashing down when the building collapsed in George, about 400 kilometers (250 miles) east of Cape Town.

Colin Deiner, the head of the provincial Western Cape disaster management services, estimated that the search-and-rescue operation would last at least three days.

“We are going to give it the absolute maximum time to see how many people we can rescue,” Deiner said during a press conference. “It is very difficult if you are working with concrete breakers and drillers close to people.