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MALLORCA

Four dead and 16 injured in Spain’s Mallorca as restaurant roof collapses

The roof of a restaurant in Spain's Balearic island of Mallorca collapsed on Thursday, killing four people and injuring 16 others, local rescuers said.

Published: 24 May 2024 09:13 CEST
Four dead and 16 injured in Spain's Mallorca as restaurant roof collapses
Emergency staff's members work after a two-storey restaurant collapsed, killing four and injuring at least 17 people on Playa de Palma, south of the Spanish Mediterranean island's capital Palma de Mallorca, on May 23, 2024. (Photo by Jaime REINA / AFP)

“There are four dead and around 16 injured,” an emergency services spokeswoman said, adding that “several nationalities” were among the victims.

The emergency services wrote on social media platform X that seven of the victims were in a “very serious” state and nine others had “serious” injuries, with different hospitals admitting them.

The two-storey building collapsed late Thursday afternoon in the Playa de Palma area to the south of the Mediterranean island’s capital Palma de Mallorca.

Firefighters were deployed in number, while ambulances whisked the victims to hospital and the street was sealed off by police to allow rescue teams to go about their work, an AFP journalist saw.

Rescuers were continuing to work at the scene to find further people stuck under the rubble, they wrote on X.

The exact cause of the collapse remained unknown.

READ MORE: ‘Excessive weight’ may have caused Mallorca restaurant collapse

One firefighter described a “nightmarish” scene to the newspaper Ultima Hora, saying that when he arrived, people were crying and screaming around the rubble piled up on the ground floor.

Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez conveyed his condolences to the victims’ families on X, saying he was “closely following the consequences of the terrible collapse”.

The central government was prepared to send “all the necessary resources” to help the regional authorities cope, he added.

Sánchez said he had spoken to the president of the Balearic Islands region, where Mallorca is located, and to the city’s mayor.

Balearic Islands President Marga Prohens said on X that she was “shocked” by the news, adding she was sending “love and warmth to the families of the four people who have lost their lives”.

Mallorca is known for its pristine waters and beaches, and the Balearic Islands attract more tourists than all Spanish regions after Catalonia.

More than 14 million tourists visited the islands last year, according to official figures.

Thursday’s collapse took place at the start of the archipelago’s high tourist season, on a beachfront avenue home to several shops and entertainment venues.

The 2009 collapse of a three-story building in Palma de Mallorca killed seven people, including two Germans and three Colombians.

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MALLORCA

Bar terrace in deadly Mallorca collapse was unlicenced

A bar involved in a deadly collapse last week on the Spanish island of Mallorca did not have a license for a roof terrace that gave way, the local mayor said on Tuesday.

Published: 28 May 2024 14:22 CEST
Bar terrace in deadly Mallorca collapse was unlicenced

The incident took place Thursday in Palma de Mallorca, the island’s capital, when the first-floor terrace, which had recently been renovated, collapsed onto the ground floor, which in turn caved in, crushing customers at a music bar located in the basement.

Two German tourists died along with a 23-year-old Spanish woman and a 44-year-old from Senegal who lived on Mallorca in Spain’s Mediterranean Balearic Isles.

“The basement had a licence to operate as a music bar, the ground floor had a restaurant licence but the first floor wasn’t licenced for any activity, nor authorised to use the terrace,” Jaime Martínez Llabres, mayor of the island’s capital Palma told reporters.

Palma’s mayor also pointed out that the preliminary conclusion of an investigation by the city’s fire department and national police is that the terrace collapsed due to a “combination” of the excessive weight resulting from renovation works carried out illegally and the overload of 21 customers who were on the first floor when it collapsed.

Chief of Palma Fire Department Eder García told journalists that the tables on the terrace were normally distributed evenly but precisely that day several were put together because there was a group of 12 Dutch customers, causing the floor to cave in.

In 2013, Palma City Hall inspectors opened several sanctioning proceedings against the premises and in 2023 Medusa Beach Club did not pass the Technical Building Inspection (ITE), so the property should have carried out the improvements proposed by municipal technicians before opening up customers again.

“There shouldn’t have been any activity on the terrace,” the fire department chief concluded.

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