At least one student was killed, dozens were injured, and 65 were feared buried in the debris after Al Khoziny Islamic boarding school building collapsed in Indonesia. Rescue workers, police, and soldiers, who had been digging through the night, pulled out eight weak and injured students more than eight hours after the collapse in Sidoarjo, East Java. Additional bodies were spotted, suggesting the death toll could rise, AP reported.Families of the students gathered at hospitals and near the collapsed building, anxiously awaiting news of their children. Relatives wailed as they watched rescuers pull a dusty, injured student from the buried prayer hall. A notice board at the command post established in the boarding school complex listed 65 students as missing as of Tuesday morning. They were mostly boys in Class 7 to Class 11, aged between twelve and seventeen. “Oh my God… my son is still buried, oh my God please help!” a mother cried hysterically upon seeing her child’s name on the board, followed by the cries of other parents facing similar losses. “Please, sir, please find my child immediately,” pleaded a father, holding the hand of one of the rescue team members. Heavy slabs of concrete, rubble, and unstable parts of the building hampered search and rescue efforts, said Nanang Sigit, a search and rescue officer leading the operation. Heavy equipment was available but not being used due to concerns it could cause further collapse. “We have been running oxygen and water to those still trapped under the debris and keeping them alive while we work hard to get them out,” Sigit said. He added that rescuers had seen several bodies under the rubble but were focused on saving those still alive. Several hundred rescuers participated in the effort, equipped with breathing apparatus, extrication tools, medical evacuation equipment, and other support devices. The students had been performing afternoon prayers in a building undergoing an unauthorised expansion when it suddenly collapsed on top of them, provincial police spokesperson Jules Abraham Abast said. Residents, teachers, and administrators assisted injured students, many with head injuries and broken bones. Female students were praying in another part of the building and managed to escape, survivors said. One male student, a thirteen-year-old boy, was killed, and ninety-nine other students were injured and taken to hospitals, some in critical condition, officials said. Authorities were investigating the cause of the collapse. Abast said the old prayer hall was two stories, but two additional floors were being added without a permit. “The old building’s foundation was apparently unable to support two floors of concrete and collapsed during the pouring process,” Abast said.
