An aerial drone photo taken on Oct. 4, 2025 shows rescuers working with an excavator on site of a collapsed school building in Sidoarjo district, East Java, Indonesia. The death toll from the collapse of a school building in Indonesia's East Java province has risen to 14, a local rescue official said on Saturday. (Photo by Sahlan Kurniawan/Xinhua)
JAKARTA, Oct. 4 (Xinhua) -- The death toll from the collapse of a school building in Indonesia's East Java province has risen to 14, a local rescue official said on Saturday.
By Friday evening, rescuers had recovered nine more bodies, bringing the number of fatalities to 14, according to Tholeb Vatelehan, a senior communication official of the East Java Search and Rescue Office.
Currently, nearly 50 people remain missing, and the death toll is expected to rise.
Rescuers deployed heavy machinery on Thursday after no further signs of life were detected. Earlier, they had relied mainly on manual excavation out of concern that heavy equipment could cause further collapse.
Part of the multi-storey Al Khoziny Islamic Boarding School in Sidoarjo district caved in on Monday during unauthorized renovation, leaving dozens of students trapped. ■
An aerial drone photo taken on Oct. 4, 2025 shows rescuers working with an excavator on site of a collapsed school building in Sidoarjo district, East Java, Indonesia. The death toll from the collapse of a school building in Indonesia's East Java province has risen to 14, a local rescue official said on Saturday. (Photo by Sahlan Kurniawan/Xinhua)
