George building collapse: Rescue team turn focus to first floor of toppled building

CAPE TOWN - Disaster management officers in George have turned their attention to the first floor of the toppled apartment block.

According to updates from the employer, cleaning teams had been working on the first storey at the time that the block collapsed.

At least 81 workers were on the premises when the building collapsed.

Thirty-two fatalities have been reported, while 20 are still unaccounted for. 

Garden Route disaster chief Gerhard Otto: "Today [Tuesday] we are still focusing on rescue. We have teams working specifically on sections B and C, they will be focused on retrieving bodies from voids we can access. Obviously, the rest of the site, everyone is working but where we can access voids, that's our priority. All our hopes is that we can still retrieve anybody alive." 

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6/13 WOMEN KNOWN TO HAVE BEEN WORKING RECOVERED

Disaster officers have recovered 6 of 13 women known to have been working as cleaners on the ill-fated apartment block.

Rescue and recovery teams are now focusing on the bottom storeys where cleaning teams had begun their work when the building folded. 

Meanwhile, officials said that identifying the recovered victims was proving difficult because of the overtones of undocumented foreign nationals.

“We are working hand-in-glove with everyone, including the police. We want to get to the point where we can identify everyone retrieved from the building rubble.”

Nine bodies, including five South Africans and a Lesotho national, have been linked to families so far.