Two dead in factory demolition disaster
PR dla Zagranicy
Nick Hodge
08.02.2013 07:00
Two workers died and two more were hospitalised on Thursday during the demolition of a former porcelain factory in Walbrzych, south west Poland.
Emergency services at the site: photo - PAP/Maciej Kulczynski
Emergency services spent seven hours searching for the victims, using sniffer dogs to scan the rubble.
One of the factory's walls collapsed directly onto the men during the demolition.
At present, it remains unclear what went wrong in the process.
“Among other factors, we will examine the preparation of the workers for the job, whether the machine operators had adequate training and if there was a health and safety coordinator present at the site,” said Agata Kostyk-Lewandowska, spokesperson for the District Labour Inspectorate in Wroclaw, as quoted by the Polish Press Agency (PAP).
The two hospitalised men are understood to be in a stable condition. One had managed to pull his own way from the rubble.
The Ksiaz (Prince) porcelain factory had been desolate since 2004, after the firm went bankrupt. The building was originally constructed in the late 1980s. (nh)