Condemned building used by homeless people falls in Brazil, killing 14 people

An apartment building condemned for more than a decade but used by homeless people collapsed in Brazil’s northeastern state of Pernambuco, killing 14 people, including six children, firefighters reported.

An apartment building condemned for more than a decade but used by homeless people collapsed in Brazil's northeastern state of Pernambuco, killing 14 people, including six children, firefighters reported.

The building in Recife's Paulista suburb crumbled in the early hours of Friday, prompting a frantic search for victims.

Searchers combed through the rubble with the help of sniffer dogs and rescued two 15-year-old girls and a 65-year-old woman alive, firefighters said on Saturday. An 18-year-old man was also removed alive, but later died from his injuries.

"Search operations are now focused on the removal of animals," the fire department said.

The building was occupied by homeless people although living there had been forbidden since 2010, the Paulista city hall said in a statement.

City officials referred to the structure as a "coffin block", a name given to buildings built on a large scale in the 1970s in the metropolitan region of Recife, the newspaper Folha de Sao Paulo reported.

The city hall statement said the problem of people using officially closed buildings in Paulista is "chronic". It said officials raised the issue during a recent visit by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, who is from the northeastern state.