A worker has died after being trapped under debris when part of a building collapsed Thursday morning in Bronzeville.
The collapse occurred shortly after 11 a.m. on Oakwood near Langley, Chicago fire officials said.
"The first company on scene was able to talk to the other workers and identify that they had three workers working and that one worker was unaccounted for," Chicago Fire Deputy Chief Shun Haynes said. "We also asked the question, 'what was the last seeing point,' and once we got the last seeing point, our members began to go through the process of digging and trying to locate the victim."
Video showed firefighters crowded around a pile of bricks and wood.
Frefighters found the worker under debris about 30 minutes later, fire officials said. The worker was trapped under three to five feet of debris, Haynes said.
The worker was removed just before noon and taken to the University of Chicago Medical Center in “grave condition,” fire officials said.
He was pronounced dead shortly afterward, according to the Cook County Medical Examiner's Office.
Julius Hall, 43, who lives a block away from the scene told the Sun-Times that crews had been working on the building since the summer.
Officials have not yet determined the cause of the collapse.
(Source: Sun-Times Media Wire & Chicago Sun-Times 2023. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.)
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