Visakhapatnam: Two children were buried alive and an adult died while five sustained injuries when a three-storied building collapsed at Ramajogipeta locality under Maharanipeta police station limits in Visakhapatnam city in the early hours of Thursday. The incident triggered panic in the locality.
The deceased were identified as S. Durga Prasad (17) and his sister S. Anjali (10) and 27-year-old Chotu, a native of Bihar. The incident took place a few hours after Anjali celebrated her birthday last night. Their parents, Kalyani and Rama Rao, escaped with injuries. The identity of the remaining injured was not known. All of them were shifted to the King George Hospital.
The NDRF, police and fire service personnel retrieved three bodies from the debris. The search and rescue operation is underway, said assistant district fire officer R. Venkataramana.
The locals said that the incident took place around 2 am and the building was over two decades old. The GVMC officials are probing the reason for the collapse. Minutes after the incident, the locals managed to rescue five persons but their efforts to save the three others proved futile.
The fire officer said Chotu lived alone in the ground floor, Rama Rao’s family in the second and three others lived in the third floor.
