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Oct 30, 2003 4:45 pm US/Eastern
(1010 WINS) (ATLANTIC CITY, N.J.) The top five stories of a casino parking garage under construction collapsed Thursday, sending twisted metal beams and slabs of broken concrete laying precariously on the rest of the building. Four people were killed and one was missing, officials said.
One person died at a hospital and two of the dead were taken out of the building, said Michael Shurman, deputy director of emergency management for Atlantic County. The fourth fatality remained in the building, Shurman said.
Authorities, worried about the building's stability, didn't send crews in right away.
"There is the real potential for a secondary collapse," said Gov. James E. McGreevey, who wouldn't say if the three missing people were believed dead or alive.
Robert Levy, director of emergency management for the city, said the building "could go at any time." He said search cameras and dogs had gone into the rubble, and trucks carrying lumber were being brought in to try and help shore up the building.
"We are planning for the worst. It's one of the worst collapses Altantic City has ever seen," Levy said.
Workers were pouring a concrete floor deck when a corner of the top floors collapsed, leaving five layers of concrete and steel sloping downward at a steep angle, said state police Capt. Ed O'Neill. Up to 30 people were initially trapped inside, he said.
Bill Crilley, 42, an insulator, working at a project in another part of the city, said he rushed to the building after hearing the collapse and saw authorities carrying one body away.
"It's ugly. Horrific. The whole stairwell is crushed," he said.
The 2,400 space, 10-story parking garage at the Tropicana Casino and Resort supports on one side an 18-story hotel tower. Both are still under construction.
"I heard all those floors go. The whole tower shook, like it was a miniature earthquake," said Jim McNeill, 56, a caulker who was working on the building when it collapsed at about 10:40 a.m.
McNeill said he looked down from the tower and saw five men lying on the ground. "It's a real good possibility that we lost a couple of guys today," McNeill said.
Harold Simmons, 42, a pipefitter who was on the second floor of the garage, said about 300-400 workers were there when it collapsed. He said he heard a rumble, then looked at a co-worker.
"It sounded like an earthquake. The whole building was shaking. You didn't know where to run. I tried to run to a staircase, but the staircase was wiped out. I went to another staircase and that one was wiped out," said Simmons, who eventually followed other workers out.
Sixteen people were at Atlantic City Medical Center. Four people were taken to Shore Memorial Hospital in Somers Point, all with cuts and bruises, said hospital spokesman Bill Elliott.
"It's a tragedy. We're devastated," said Maureen Siman, a casino spokeswoman.
Construction workers gathered on the street nearby to gaze up at the collapsed frame of the structure.
Alfonso Hernandez, 39, a construction foreman, said he had just walked around the corner to a hardware store and heard the noise. He said all eight members of his crew were accounted for.
"It was like a freight train coming through," Hernandez said. "It's scary. We don't know if we lost any of our brothers in there."
Family members began arriving at the scene looking for their loved ones. "He was working up there last night, I know," said one distraught woman.
The parking garage is part of a Tropicana expansion project that has been under way since April 2002. It was scheduled for completion in March.
Named "The Quarter," the development was meant to include not only the garage but a 200,000-square-foot shopping area, all on a 31/2-acre parcel bordered by Atlantic, Pacific, Iowa and Brighton avenues. Tropicana officials have seen the project as a way to diversify the casino's offerings with more non-gambling forms of entertainment.
The general contractor of the garage was the Keating Construction Corp., said Jennifer Monahan, a spokesmwoman for the state Division of Codes and Standards. Officials at Keating did not immediately return calls for comment on Thursday.
