This is the moment a three-story residential building in northern Nigeria collapsed on Wednesday (September 11) following torrential rain.
Eyewitness video filmed by local resident Chukwuemeka Derick Erokwu at around 12.30pm shows the horrifying moment the building on Nikisi Aroli Street in Onitsha city, Anambra State, crumples to the ground as onlookers scream in fear.
A large puff of smoke is left in the building's wake.
In a telephone interview on Friday morning, filmer Erokwu told Newsflare: “I was in my house a few blocks away. I heard screams, it was so loud [that] I had to come out. I saw people evacuating. The block had been shaking for an hour. When people had finished coming out, it was shaking.
"I was outside the house for about 20 minutes. Some were still trying to go back up to pick up stuff, to save the things they had.
"A few minutes later it collapsed.
"It was really painful. Most folks lost everything. They were traumatised.”
A police spokesperson in the state Haruna Mohammad confirmed the incident as well as another building collapse in the area to the local Guardian newspaper. He added that Commissioner of Police John Abang had ordered immediate deployment of police personnel to secure the area.
General Manager of the Lagos State Building Control Agency, Abiola Kosegbe, has declared many buildings in the state as distressed, the paper reported.
Luckily, there were no casualties.
Eyewitness video filmed by local resident Chukwuemeka Derick Erokwu at around 12.30pm shows the horrifying moment the building on Nikisi Aroli Street in Onitsha city, Anambra State, crumples to the ground as onlookers scream in fear.
A large puff of smoke is left in the building's wake.
In a telephone interview on Friday morning, filmer Erokwu told Newsflare: “I was in my house a few blocks away. I heard screams, it was so loud [that] I had to come out. I saw people evacuating. The block had been shaking for an hour. When people had finished coming out, it was shaking.
"I was outside the house for about 20 minutes. Some were still trying to go back up to pick up stuff, to save the things they had.
"A few minutes later it collapsed.
"It was really painful. Most folks lost everything. They were traumatised.”
A police spokesperson in the state Haruna Mohammad confirmed the incident as well as another building collapse in the area to the local Guardian newspaper. He added that Commissioner of Police John Abang had ordered immediate deployment of police personnel to secure the area.
General Manager of the Lagos State Building Control Agency, Abiola Kosegbe, has declared many buildings in the state as distressed, the paper reported.
Luckily, there were no casualties.
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