Race to find survivors as dozens still missing in Lagos collapse

A high-rise building under construction collapsed in Nigeria's commercial capital Lagos on Nov. 1, killing at least four people with dozens more feared trapped inside the rubble.

A yellow excavator pushed away concrete slabs to search through the wreckage of the 21-floor building in Lagos's wealthy Ikoyi residential and business district, AFP correspondents at the scene said.

Rescue officials said many workers were caught inside the building when it crumbled, though they could not confirm the number of people trapped inside.

Ibrahim Farinloye of the National Emergency Management Agency (NEMA) said four people had been rescued so far and four bodies recovered from the site.

Lagos State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu called for calm late on Monday, as rescue efforts continued after dark.
Emergency services are "on the site, battling to save the lives of those under the rubble," Gbenga Omotoso, a spokesperson for the governor said in a statement.

Wisdom John, 28, a bricklayer, said he escaped with just a few cuts because he had been on the ground floor when the building collapsed into a pile of concrete, its floors sandwiched together.

"There was more than 50 working today and the manager too," he said, sitting in an ambulance getting treated. "We just ran out."

The Ikoyi area is one of the wealthier residential and business districts in Lagos, Nigeria's densely populated major commercial city.

Building collapses are common in Lagos and other parts of Africa's most populous country because of sub-standard materials, negligence and the flouting of construction regulations.

Near Nov. 1' collapse site, soldiers kept back a crowd of onlookers watching the rescue operation.

Dozens of angry local...