At least 26 killed in Ugandan church collapse
9/3/2006 17:48
At least 26 people were killed in a church collapse accident overnight in
a downpour in the northern suburb of Kampala, hospital official said
today.
"Six people died after they were rushed in among 89 injured last
night," Ssekabira Eliphaz, the official of Mulago Hospital told Xinhua, bringing
the death toll to at least 26, including 20 victims, on the site.
"The
remaining 83 injured were still under treatment, most of them in severe
conditions," the official of the biggest and best equipped hospital of the
capital added.
Plain clothe police restrained access to the clinic section
while dozens of families waited in the hallway in anxiety. Another hospital
official said the wounds seemed not serious, but they were deep cuts in most
cases.
This was the deadliest church accident in the east African country, of
which two-thirds of its 27 million population were Christians. Two collapses in
2002 and 2003 killed four and two people respectively.
Ugandan authorities
vowed to investigate the malpractice in this accident after the roof of the
unfinished building fell off in a thunderstorm Wednesday evening.
Witnesses
said some 200 prayers were trapped in the rubble with dozens rushed in to seek
shelter from the heavy rainfall.
Xinhua
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