Greek authorities say they are trying to discover what caused a two-storey apartment block in the heart of ancient Athens to collapse “in a matter of seconds”, killing six people. Emergency teams found the victims, including four American tourists, on Saturday, more than 24 hours after the early morning explosion in the historic Plaka district. The fire service said the bodies of three women and three men had been found, but stopped short of identifying them.
A Briton and his Greek wife, 77 and 78, who lived in a flat on the building’s upper floor, were among those killed, the Guardian was told. What could have happened to bring the building down in a matter of seconds?” Rescuers had deployed thermal cameras and geophones, used to detect deep subsonic frequencies, in the hope of finding survivors. Earth-moving machines and specially trained search dogs were brought in to move and comb mounds of rubble through the night.
Before the bodies were pulled from the ruins on Saturday, police put the missing at six, saying four were Americans staying in a short-term rental on the building’s first floor. Two brothers and their wives, all four were due to fly to the US on Friday, just hours after the explosion. The picturesque district draws thousands of visitors daily, with many staying overnight in the hotels and short-term rentals in neoclassical houses and small apartment blocks along its alleyways and narrow streets.
The mayor of Athens, Haris Doukas, who rushed to 15 Lysikratous, where the mid-20th-century building had once stood, was quick to describe the incident as an “unprecedented disaster”. At least three people were known to have been injured when the explosion occurred at 7.30am, shattering the windows of nearby buildings and scattering debris far and wide. A motorist driving down Lysikratous described how his car was lifted into the air by the sheer force of a blast that some in the neighbourhood likened to an earthquake, others to a bomb.
Emergency workers could be seen hastily removing two women on stretchers from a building next door who had been wounded by flying debris. Speculation is rife that a gas leak triggered the collapse but officials said there were many “cogent theories” at play. Fears of the leak emanating from the first-floor short-term rental was among them.
As part of efforts to address a burgeoning housing crisis, Greece’s centre-right government has sought to ban short-term rentals in Plaka – clamping down on permits and tightening regulations. On Saturday, as speculation mounted over the cause of the blast, criticism grew over the ability to “properly control” establishments that were often unregulated.
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