Russia: Blast kills at least 1; several feared trapped under rubble
By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
A natural-gas blast ripped through an apartment building in Russia's Tatarstan region early Wednesday, killing at least one person and leaving several others feared trapped beneath the rubble, officials said.
The explosion brought down an entire section of the three-story brick building in Tatarstan's capital, Kazan. Russian television showed footage of the ruins - a jagged remnant of a wall and a pile of rubble with smoke or steam wafting into the frigid air.
One woman was killed and two other people were hospitalized, Emergency Situations Ministry spokesman Viktor Beltsov said.
Citing an unidentified regional emergency official, the state-run RIA-Nosvotsi news agency said as many as 15 people could be trapped in the rubble.