The top floor of a building under construction in the haredi neighborhood of
Geula in Jerusalem collapsed on Monday morning, injuring two workers.
One
worker suffered a broken leg and the other was moderately injured. Immediately
after the collapse, firefighters searched the building but did not find anyone
trapped inside.
As is typical with incidents in ultra-Orthodox
neighborhoods, thousands of curious onlookers gathered around the site of the
accident, forcing police to call in larger forces for crowd
control.
Police detained the foreman of the project for questioning.
Traffic was closed on Malchei Yisrael Street, the site of the collapse, for a
number of hours after the incident at 11:30 a.m.
Jerusalem Mayor Nir
Barkat arrived to inspect the damage. According to eyewitnesses, the building
began to sway very slowly before it collapsed, allowing most of the people to
clear away from the site before the top part of the building came crashing down.