Accident at work Collapse of scaffolding in Lausanne claims three lives
The rescue services were faced with a scene of destruction.
Image: Keystone
Rega was also called to the scene of the accident.
Image: Keystone
According to the police spokesman, several injured people were found on the rubble of the scaffolding.
Image: Keystone
The rescue services were faced with a scene of destruction.
Image: Keystone
Rega was also called to the scene of the accident.
Image: Keystone
According to the police spokesman, several injured people were found on the rubble of the scaffolding.
Image: Keystone
At least three people have lost their lives in a serious accident on a construction site in the west of Lausanne. At least eight other people suffered injuries when scaffolding around 60 meters high collapsed in Prilly VD.
According to current information, all of the victims were construction workers, the Vaud cantonal police announced on Friday afternoon.
Four people were seriously injured and four others suffered moderate or minor injuries. One of the seriously injured was taken by Rega helicopter to Geneva University Hospital. Six other people had to be treated at Lausanne University Hospital.
Still missing
However, the outcome is not yet definitive. Police spokesman Jean-Christophe Sauterel told the French news agency AFP that they were still looking for one or two missing persons. Debris piled up on the street in front of the building after the accident.
The report of the accident was received by the emergency call center at 09:22 in the morning. The workers were building the "Prilly Phare" in the west of Lausanne - a 19-storey wooden residential tower in which 96 apartments are to be built. The "Malley Lumières" shopping center is being extended by 14 storeys on its western side for the project.
Huge cloud of dust
An employee of a pharmacy in the shopping center reported hearing a loud noise and seeing a huge cloud of dust. Several witnesses, including construction workers, told the Keystone-SDA news agency that a freight elevator had plunged downwards, taking the entire scaffolding on the north side of the building with it.
The authorities initially refused to confirm these statements. For the time being, they did not provide any information on the cause or the exact course of the accident. These are still unclear, they said. The responsible public prosecutor's office opened a criminal investigation.
The roads around the construction site, a nearby track and the access roads to the surrounding buildings remained closed in the late afternoon, as further debris threatened to fall.
Bad weather
The fire department and specialist companies are working to secure the remaining part of the scaffolding, the police wrote in their communiqué. The bad weather forecast with the threat of thunderstorms made this task more difficult.
After the scaffolding collapsed, both the shopping center, including all the offices located there, and the nearby Vaudoise Arena were evacuated.
At HC Lausanne's home stadium, rescue workers subsequently tended to the injured. Specialists also looked after around twenty people who were physically unharmed but had suffered a shock.
SDA
