Lahore: At least 18 people were killed and 51 injured when the roof of a factory collapsed near the eastern Pakistani city of Lahore on Wednesday, officials said, with around a hundred more still trapped.
The incident comes less than two weeks after a powerful 7.5-magnitude earthquake ripped across Afghanistan and Pakistan, killing nearly 390 people, levelling thousands of homes, and causing structural damage to major buildings.
"We have recovered 18 dead bodies and more than 70 people alive, 51 of them are injured and have been taken to hospitals," said Mohammad Usman, the top administration official in Lahore who was coordinating the response to the disaster in the city, the capital of Punjab province.
"Rescue work is ongoing," he said as teams of rescuers, police and soldiers worked through the night under lights searching for survivors beneath the rubble of the four-storey factory.
The army said it was deploying specialist search teams and engineers to help the rescue effort.
