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The number of fatalities from a devastating school building collapse in Indonesia escalated to 14 on Friday as emergency crews pulled multiple victims from under the rubble. Numerous of students remain unaccounted for and the number of casualties is anticipated to rise.

Search Operations Ramp Up as Survivor Search Narrows

At first, emergency personnel searched by hand for survivors after the structure caved in on Monday. But with no more detections of survivors detected by Thursday, they turned to large machinery equipped with demolition tools to help them progress more rapidly.

Crews worked in the hot sun on Friday to break up and clear massive pieces of debris, with the odor of decomposing bodies a somber indication of what they would find below.

By the evening, they had recovered nine bodies, bringing the confirmed fatality count to 14, with approximately 50 students remaining missing.

Specifics of the Structural Failure

The structure fell on top of hundreds of people on Monday in a worship area at the century-old Al Khoziny Islamic boarding school in Sidoarjo in East Java, about 780km (480 miles) to the east of Jakarta.

The chief of Indonesia’s National Disaster Mitigation Agency, Suharyanto, informed the media at the site on Friday that the retrieval operation were expected to be complete by the end of Saturday.

The students were mostly boys in grades seven to 12, between 12 and 19 years old. Girls were praying in a different section of the building and were able to get out safely, eyewitnesses said.

Survivor Account: Escape from the Debris

Thirteen-year-old Rizalul Qoib, one of 104 those who escaped, came back to the scene on Friday to look at what was left of his school, and said he was fortunate to have escaped with only a minor gash to his head.

He said, like the others, he had been engaged in worship when he heard something like the noise of crumbling material, which got louder and louder.

“I stopped praying and ran when I felt the floor trembling,” he remembered. “All at once the building collapsed, the debris of the roof fell on my head, my face.”

Then the room became pitch black, but he heard someone yelling, “over here, this way” and he obeyed the sound until he finally found a narrow gap in the rubble.

“I just went toward the light,” Qoib said.

Many of the other individuals who were injured but escaped or were rescued experienced serious head trauma and fractures, and are continuing to receive care in the hospital.

Reason of the Disaster

Authorities have said the building was two floors, but two more levels were being added without a permit. Law enforcement said the old building’s foundation apparently was unable to support the additional weight and collapsed during the pouring process.

Administrative staff have so far declined to speak.