11 killed in high-rise collapse in Egypt

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Associated Press

Posted on July 15, 2012 at 3:31 PM

Updated Sunday, Jul 15 at 3:34 PM

ALEXANDRIA, Egypt (AP) — Egypt's Health Ministry says an apartment tower under construction has collapsed on adjacent buildings in the Mediterranean city of Alexandria, killing 11 people.

The ministry says five other people were injured and that search teams are searching for survivors buried under rubble.

The 11-story building in a poor Alexandria neighborhood collapsed late Saturday onto three adjacent buildings, reducing much of the structures to rubble. All the dead and injured lived in the three smaller buildings.

Building collapses are not uncommon in Egypt, where shoddy construction is widespread in shantytowns, poor city neighborhoods and rural areas. With real estate at a premium in big cities like Alexandria and Cairo, developers seeking bigger profits frequently violate planning permits and exceed the number of stories allowed.

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