Building Collapse in George

Rescue workers reported making contact with 11 people under the rubble in a race to save dozens still unaccounted for after a building collapsed in the South African city of George killing at least seven.

Thirty-three people have been pulled out of the debris of the five-storey apartment block, which caved in Monday afternoon while under construction, municipal authorities said.

Seven of those have died, the authorities said in George, 400 kilometers east of Cape Town.

Forty-two people were still unaccounted for, including the 11 with whom contact had been established, the authorities said.

With the second night of rescue work underway, emergency services personnel surrounded a hole where a survivor was pulled out of the rubble and put onto a stretcher.

It took rescue personnel 17 hours to bring one of the victims out of the rubble after they were initially located.

Recalling that the international standard for such operations is three days, George mayor Leon van Wyk told a local television station in the early evening that "over the next 40-odd hours we are hoping to rescue as many people" as operations entered a second day.

A construction crew of 75 people was on site at the time of the collapse, authorities said.

Three rescue teams were working on three different areas of the collapsed building, which included an underground car park.

The reasons for the collapse were still unknown.

President Cyril Ramaphosa offered his "deep condolences to the relatives and friends" and said his thoughts were with the families of the dead and missing.

He called for an investigation, saying it must "bring closure to the community and prevent a repeat of this disaster".

George, which has a population of about 160,000, is a picturesque coastal city located on the tourist trail along South Africa's southern coastline.