At least three dead in Andorra bridge collapse

Sun Nov 8 2009 13:43:35

At least three workers have been killed after a viaduct under construction collapsed in the small south-western European country of Andorra on Saturday afternoon.

Six others have been badly injured and two are believed still to be buried under rubble.

Sources say there were a number of Portuguese people among the team working on the Dos Valires tunnel and bridge structure at the time.

The accident, at a point linking the main road to the tunnel mouth, happened at about noon local time, when around 20 metres of the concrete road bridge collapsed.

Interior Minister Victor Naudi said: "There is one builder who is located but he is surrounded by iron... At the very beginning we thought that it wouldn't take so much time, but in this situation time is relative. About the other person who is still missing, we need first to rescue the other person buried to have a new corridor to try to get to the other person."

Andorra's head of government, Jaume Bartumeu, added: "We are here to confirm, not to declare, we are here just to confirm, that we are going to make all the investigations needed to find out the cause of the accident."

Work on the Dos Valires tunnel, which links the towns of Encamp and La Massana, is scheduled to finish next year.

© Independent Television News Limited 2009. All rights reserved.