Man, woman trapped in Ruai collapsed lodging

A man and woman are still trapped in a collapsed lodging in Ruai, Njiru Sub-County.

Reports show the lodging nicknamed - Mombasa Ndogo - collapsed at 4am, trapping the two and a caretaker inside. The caretaker was rescued around 8am and rushed to Mama Lucy Hospital in Embakasi.

Patrick Muli, Deputy County Commissioner of Njiru Sub-County confirmed that at the time of the collapse, the lodging had three occupants.

“The caretaker was rescued in the morning and rushed to hospital. He’s now in stable condition,” he said.

Woman’s cry

However, it has been a long wait for the two trapped inside the three-storey building. Muli says since the lodging collapsed, a woman had been crying for help. The voice stopped around 8am. The operation took the whole day and by the 7pm, the two had not been rescued. A witness, Sammy Mwaniki who owns a shop nearby says he heard loud bang around 4am and came to see what was happening.

“Initially l thought it was an accident but found it was a building that had collapsed. Since l suspected there must be people trapped, l started making calls, waking up people to come help in the rescue,” he says.

Ruai MCA and deputy speaker Nairobi County, John Kamangu says he arrived at the scene of the collapsed house at 6am, just at the same time when rescue operations was starting. Kamangu reveals the lodging had been earmarked for demolition by Kenya National Highways Authority (KeNHA) because it was built on road reserve.

“It was just a matter of time before KeNHA brought it down the lodging. Unfortunately it has collapsed with people inside,” he said, adding that the owner of the building has gone into hiding. Ministry of Housing’s Patrick Mbucha says the building was hurriedly built using substandard materials.

“The building was hastily done using sub-standard materials. The owner was in hurry to meet the high demand for the houses,” he said.

Mbucha says in the last one week they had demolished 3,000 houses built either along power lines or road reserves. The search and rescue operation was led by Nairobi City County Emergency Rescue Team.