MADRID, Sept. 19 (Xinhua) -- Tuesday's accident at the Ritz Hotel in Madrid which claimed the life of one worker and left 11 more injured could have been caused by "excess weight" placed on the structure of the building, the Madrid City Hall commented on Wednesday.
The accident saw part of the superstructure on the sixth floor of the building give way and crash down through the floors beneath, shortly after 16:00 hours Tuesday during refurbishment work at the hotel.
Investigations into the cause of the accident have only just started, and Jose Manuel Calvo, who is responsible for Sustainable Urban Development at the Madrid City Hall, commented that a possible cause for the accident was that too much weight had been placed on the superstructure of the sixth floor, causing it to give way.
Jesus Garcia Cortijo, who is responsible for the Investigation and Judicial Coordination Unit of the Madrid Municipal Police force, said that excess weight is not the only hypothesis investigators are looking at and that investigations could continue for "two or three months."
Garcia Cortijo told the media that the area has been cordoned off and in the coming days, municipal technical staff will check to see which parts of the building affected by the accident will need to be demolished, before development work can continue.
The man who died has been described as a 42-year-old man of African origin, while one of the two people who were seriously injured in the accident is reported to be "stable and evolving favorably" from his injury.
No news has been released about the state of the second seriously injured man at the request of his family.
Five of the remaining 9 injured workers have been allowed home, with 4 more receiving treatment in hospitals in the capital.
