Four dead in restaurant collapse on Spanish holiday island

Spanish firefighters searched the rubble of a beach restaurant on the holiday island of Mallorca for clues on Friday after it partially collapsed. Four people were killed and 16 injured.

Authorities, who declared three days of mourning, gave no immediate indication of the cause, but a fire official said the “excessive mass” of the crowd in the building was most likely the cause.

The dead were two German women aged 20 and 30, a 44-year-old Senegalese man and a 23-year-old Spaniard who had worked at the venue, a police spokesman said.

The crowded two-story building collapsed late Thursday afternoon in a busy tourist district of Palma de Mallorca, the capital of the Mediterranean island.

In the Balearic Islands, which include Ibiza and Menorca, the tourist season is already in full swing.

An AFP journalist reported that firefighters were deployed in large numbers, ambulances were taking victims to hospital and police were blocking the road so that rescue teams could work.

Of the 16 injured, eight are still in hospital, all of them Dutch citizens, the mayor of Palma de Mallorca, Antonio Jimenez, told reporters after observing a minute’s silence for the victims.

“The seriously injured are out of danger,” he added.

-‘Screaming, crying, hysteria’ –

The deceased Senegalese man and the deceased Spaniard both lived on the island, Jimenez said, adding that it was a “very sad” day for the city.

Local media reported that the Senegalese man and a compatriot saved a swimmer from drowning in December 2017, earning him a police medal the following year.

The building included the Medusa Beach Club – a ground-floor restaurant with a rooftop terrace – and a basement bar, all of which were overcrowded at the time of the disaster.

Palma Fire Chief Eder Garcia said the restaurant’s floor had collapsed onto the bar below. “That’s where we found most of the victims.”

“The causes are being investigated. The first hypothesis is that it may be due to excessive weight,” he told reporters at the scene, adding that the building had “an old structure.”

A technical team was on site on Friday to determine the cause of the collapse.

Santiago Aranga, a local who was walking his dog across the street from the beachfront venue at the time of the accident, said he heard a “bang” that sounded “like a bomb.”

“There was screaming, crying, hysteria,” he told television station TRECE.

Most of the people in the area were German tourists and “it was very difficult to calm them down and get people to look out the window in another language. I don’t understand or speak German,” he added.

– “A lot of excitement” –

Another local resident, Vicky Garcia, said the venue had only recently reopened after renovations.

“We heard a roar, then lots of police, lots of firefighters, a lot of commotion,” she told local television IB3.

At an economic forum in Barcelona, ​​Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez expressed his condolences to the families of the victims.

“I would also like to express my best wishes for a speedy recovery to those injured,” he added.

Mallorca is known for its pristine waters and beaches, and the Balearic Islands attract more tourists than any other Spanish region except Catalonia.

According to official figures, more than 14 million tourists visited the islands last year.

Thursday’s collapse occurred at the start of the archipelago’s peak tourist season on a beachfront street lined with shops and entertainment venues.

When a three-story building collapsed in Palma de Mallorca in 2009, seven people were killed, including three Colombians and two Germans.

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