Deadly Brooklyn building collapse: FDNY officials update search & rescue efforts

Search and rescue efforts ongoing at the site of a deadly building collapse in Flatbush, Brooklyn. That's right. Right now, we know at least eight people. Eight people are dead and more than a dozen others are injured, including several children. Joining us now with the very latest on the search for survivors, FDNY Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore and Chief of Department John Esposito. Thank you so very much for being here this morning. Good morning. Can you just bring us up to speed on where things stand right now with what your crews are out there doing this morning? I mean, obviously, it's a very difficult situation out there. They've been doing incredible work, really heroic out there all night since 4 p.m. Just searching for people. So it's a very methodical, regimented process that's going on right now. You may look at this and see people all over the place and we see a very prescribed approach to trying to find survivors. And Chief, we know that there are drones up, there are crews on the ground, but a lot of this is literally digging by hand. I mean, trying to get piece by piece to people who may be down there. Once we get the surface victims out, It becomes a very complex, time-consuming search, where crawling in and around the collapse, looking for void spaces, searching those void spaces, and then you literally see us using buckets, and our great partners with Con Ed, we use their Con Ed vac trucks to remove a lot of that debris, and it's just, to me, it's very reminiscent of the... Of the searches we were doing at the Trade Center. I know, seeing everybody covered in dust, I was thinking the same thing. And, you know, we have to get that out and completely uncover the victims before we get them out. But it's, you know, it's what now, 15 hours into the operation and we're continuing to rotate our people. And, you know, unfortunately, we've had, you know, we've had several deaths. So there are reports that you're using dogs right now, and they're barking, and that may be a sign there is still life underneath the rubble. What can you tell us on that, about that? When we're conducting these searches, we use the dogs to kind of point us in a direction to where we're going to search and dig. So at one point last night, after we had completed the searches ...or the areas that we had access to. We pulled everybody off and we had the fire department dogs, the police department dogs go and they give us a general idea of where to look. What can we talk about the rain coming in? Mike, Mike is saying around noon, definitely heavier later this afternoon. How will that impact this search? We're very concerned about the rain. It's definitely going to make it more difficult. You know, it's mud. It'll turn to mud. It's very heavy. So, you know, we're working diligently now to try to find as many victims as we can. We will work through the rain if we have to, but it certainly is going to make things a little more challenging. What's the concern level that there could be a secondary collapse? I mean, because when we look at this, this is one building that has collapsed, and then there's a second building behind it that is also of concern here? So the building that we'll look into, almost like the doll, that was... Next to the building that collapsed. So last night we had some of that building that we were in danger of collapse that we kind of pushed that off and let it fall. So, Chief, we're looking at the scene right now. We can see six of those, what are they, three-story townhouses. So there was a seventh. That's completely gone. That's rubble. Now the sixth one that was adjacent to it is in danger. Well, you know, I think that's a real danger. Well, what... Yes, I mean, I... We've searched that building. We're confident that that's not going to fall. But there's a lot of that that could pieces that could fall off of that. We there were pieces that were loose that we that we knocked off so that they won't fall and that we're able to conduct our searches, you know, in the shadow of that building. So much of this is finding people who may be down there. Obviously, there are recovery efforts for those who have died. But I just want to draw your I want to draw your attention to this moment yesterday Pregnant woman, six months pregnant, was pulled out of there. And then her husband or the father of the child just broke down in tears. What was that moment like? Can you talk us through how that happened? I think, you know, we have to understand that we're all just people, including the first responders, all just people. And he had thought he had lost his wife. He didn't know. And she was pregnant. And we were able to recover her and pull her out alive and get her to the hospital. It does a lot for the community. It also does a lot for the first responders. When they see that there's people in there that are viable, it just rejuvenates and reenergizes their efforts. Is she still okay? Is she okay? Is the baby okay? As far as we know, she was fine, yeah, when she got to the hospital, as far as we know. What do you want the public to know right now about where things are and what could come next? We're continuing our search operation, and we'll be there until we're absolutely sure there's nobody left. But this is a very practiced plan we have, our collapse rescue plan. We, at our technical rescue school at the Fire Academy on Randall's Island, all of these firefighters have practiced and drilled with this. We have an all-hazards training simulator named after and dedicated to Ray Downey. Yeah. You know, incidentally, two of his sons or his two sons were operating here yesterday. They were part of the rescue operation? Chuck Downey was the deputy chief in the 15th Division, the initial incident commander. And Joe Downey is the chief of rescue operations overseeing the rescue part. So this is very well practiced. Thank you. We've done this. We do this routinely throughout the city. This obviously is a very major collapse. We have a lot of minor collapses throughout the year, but I believe we have the best experienced and trained firefighters and EMTs and paramedics. It was the sight to see, to see all our firefighters down there and then our rescue medics with them being able to get in there and treat while the firefighters are digging them out, that our rescue medics in that collapse pile Starting to treat the victims and then take them out and give them to EMS. who was in a line waiting for those victims to come out. It's really incredible to watch. Response time. Are we happy with the response time yesterday? We were there in less than a minute. So one of our units were actually driving past when it happened. And they were the ones that started the efforts. Engine 255, who's in the neighborhood, they could see the dust cloud. They thought maybe it was a fire. They were there in less than a minute. And, you know, transmitted a signal for a major collapse, brought in all these additional resources, and immediately went to work making rescues from the adjacent building. By the way, that area is very busy. Yeah, it sure is. What challenges did your men and women have trying to, you know, get there and, you know, get more personnel there? Yeah, I think we do a pretty good job getting people out of the way when it really, really counts. And people were cooperative, right, in getting, but we have a lot of apparatus there. And there are a lot of other agencies there. So I would offer to the public that, you know, although you want to take a peek and see what's going on, it's most important that... We should just stay out of the area so that we can operate. We can get those people in and out. The ambulances can move freely. We won't have to contend with traffic or, you know, people watching the scene. I just want to ask one more thing, if we can. There may be people watching this morning who know someone who doesn't have answers this morning, who is waiting to find out about a loved one. Can you give them any idea of how long this might take or what would you want to tell them? This, I mean, this again, very painstaking situation, this could take, you know, a day, two days, three days, depending on how we... We're able to operate on the scene, so I would say just know that the fire department and all the other first responders are in there trying to find your loved ones. If anybody is missing, you should seek help. They had set up a reception center at the YMCA in the neighborhood, so let us know if you think someone's missing. It helps us as well. If there's somebody missing, they should contact the NYPD missing persons so that we can, we're working with the PD to try to figure out who from that building that collapsed is still unaccounted for. Thank you so much, Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore We appreciate it. And Chief John Esposito, appreciate your men and women out there in all kinds of weather They're great And they'll be there until we're done And New Yorkers should be proud that we believe they've got the best fire department in the world. Thank you. Thank you both very much.