Jalandhar Factory Collapse: Survivors Pulled From Debris Of Blanket Factory (PHOTOS)

Indian emergency workers search through the debris of a collapsed factory during a rescue operation in Jalandhar, India, Monday, April 16, 2012. Several people are feared to be trapped after a three-storey building of the factory collapsed after a blast in the factory's boiler, according to local news reports. (AP Photo/Davinder Luther)

JALANDHAR, INDIA -- Officials say a three-story blanket factory has collapsed in northern India, killing at least five people. At least a dozen others are believed trapped under huge piles of broken concrete.

Officials could not say exactly how many people remain missing after pulling dozens of survivors from the debris in Jalandhar, a town in Punjab state.

Nightshift workers at the factory said they heard the building creak before the walls and ceiling crashed down before midnight Sunday.

Officials say rescuers are trying to reach at least one man still alive under the rubble, but unable to move.

Comments

[juststeve35]

07:31 PM on 04/17/2012

Right...

A 'blanket' factory....

Must have been the weight of all that cotton and fleece that did it!

[camelias and sweet tea]

06:26 PM on 04/17/2012

Guess that is why my Governor insists they say "It's a great day in S.C." compared to India it is.

[kingbulliet]

04:31 PM on 04/16/2012

Seems the workers are expendable...just another reason from a mountain of them why countries like India-Bolivia, even China need Unions and Organizers that are protected-not killed.
But what do the Republicans in the U.S. do? Pass every law they can to help kill off the Union movement.

[twain307]

03:23 PM on 04/16/2012

We spent a century improving working conditions so things like this would not happen in America. One of the worst examples was the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire;
http://www.csun.edu/~ghy7463/mw2.html
People that spend all their time bitchin' about regulations tend to forget that there was a reason (often a tragedy) that accounts for them.

[The Dude67]

03:04 PM on 04/16/2012

Gee look at all those very large chunks of concrete.  I thought concrete was pulverized into dust when involved in a building collapse.  And look at all those floor stacked up.  I mean you can almost see the individual floors.. again, when a building collapses the floors are supposed to disintegrate into nothing, not stack up like these photos.  

I think these are fake.

[Billy Jack]

03:33 PM on 04/16/2012

What you describe only happens when a building is demolished via detonation of carefully placed explosives designed specially for that purpose

[The Dude67]

05:04 PM on 04/16/2012

No, Billy, I believe me, I wouldn't con you cuz you're the badest of the bad, but according to the 911 commission the floors just stacked up on top of themselves (at a rate of 10 floors per second) and then somehow just sorta vaporized.  There were no big chunks of concrete like with this 3 story collapse and the WTC buildings were 110 stories of concrete... so you know it just sorta blew up, you know?

[WriterGuy]

03:43 PM on 04/16/2012

I hope you're being sarcastic.

Because the collapse of a three-story wood & concrete structure from an exploding boiler (which presumable destabilizes the foundation and/or central columns of the structure) is exactly like the WTC. Yeah, right...

[The Dude67]

05:06 PM on 04/16/2012

no no... you're right, the force of concrete falling onto concrete (at a rate of 10 floors per second, btw) just mashes that concrete into dust.  I get it.  That's why I'm saying these photos must be fake.

[BoycottFox2]

02:56 PM on 04/16/2012

America tomorrow under Republican rule.

[GandenT]

04:31 PM on 04/16/2012

Freedom!!!! LOL

[satanlite]

02:47 PM on 04/16/2012

If we didn't have regulations concerning construction in this country we'd have the same thing here. Remember that the next time the GOP starts talking about their "jobs" bills.

[squiddypie8]

11:48 AM on 04/16/2012

Jalandhar may be suprised. But Im not

[LogicalMathMan]

11:38 AM on 04/16/2012

The absence of building codes and corruption will do this every time. RIP.

[satanlite]

02:48 PM on 04/16/2012

That's the country the GOP wants to have here.