The result of the research, in the rubble of the two buildings which had collapsed on Saturday morning in the center of Lille, is dramatic. Rescuers found the lifeless body of a victim overnight from Saturday to Sunday, probably that of a missing doctor. The victim was located shortly before 1:30 a.m. The prefecture confirmed the discovery of a deceased person.
According to the commander of relief operations, Stéphane Beauventre, “there is a lot of convergence so that we are on the person we have been looking for since noon”, a 45-year-old doctor, who had been given an apartment in the building for the weekend. “His body went to the forensic institute. It will be clearly identified later,” he said.
Two three-storey buildings, one of which was under construction, had collapsed on Saturday around 9:15 a.m. on rue Pierre-Mauroy, a shopping street in the city center, but most of the inhabitants had been able to be evacuated thanks to the alert launched by one of them a few hours earlier.
The building was not “unsanitary”
Several politicians had initially indicated that there were “a priori” no victims, before the firefighters announced that they were looking for this doctor whose car was parked on the spot and who had not presented himself to his appointment. Another person, slightly injured, could be evacuated above the rubble on Saturday afternoon, according to the emergency services.
“We have just passed the dogs again for a final removal of doubt. We are going to proceed with the lifting of the entire system, ”said Lieutenant-Colonel Stéphane Beauventre during the night. “The scene now is frozen for the prosecutor. The Lille prosecutor’s office has indeed indicated that it has opened an investigation for “endangering the lives of others” and has commissioned “a judicial expertise”. According to the Minister Delegate for Housing, Olivier Klein, who will travel to Lille on Monday, this building was not “stricken with insalubrity”.