Hope Fades In Moscow Roof Collapse

Power shovels scooped up tons of rubble at a Moscow market where the roof collapsed, killing at least 57 people. Officials said there was virtually no hope of anyone still alive under the wreckage.

"Maybe there is some kind of zone where there may be people, but the probability of this is very small," Mayor Yuri Luzhkov said at the scene.

At least 32 other people were injured when the roof fell in before dawn Thursday, emergency officials said.

The probable cause was either the buildup of heavy snow, design flaws or maintenance errors, Moscow Prosecutor Anatoly Zuyev said. Prosecutors have opened a criminal investigation on charges of negligence leading to deaths, the RIA-Novosti news agency reported.

Virtually all the victims were believed to be workers from Azerbaijan and other former Soviet republics, among the thousands who have poured into the Russian capital to fill low-paying jobs such as those at the city's produce and houseware markets.

"The main thing I want to say is that this was not a terrorist act and not an action of personnel in the market that could have led to the collapse," Luzhkov said.

Emergency officials said it was impossible to say how many people had been in the Basmanny market in east-central Moscow when it collapsed, but survivors and witnesses said there could have been up to 100 people or more performing wholesale transactions or simply sleeping in the building.

The market is one of the city's biggest wholesale and retail markets, and some officials expressed relief that the collapse did not occur later in the day, when it would have been filled with shoppers taking advantage of the first day of a three-day weekend marking Defenders of the Fatherland Day, honoring Russia's armed forces.

Two to three inches of wet snow had fallen overnight, on top of the 18 inches that had fallen since the start of winter, the Russian Weather Service said.

On Thursday, trapped survivors had called relatives using cell phones, helping rescuers find them, authorities said.

The roof, which had a special gutter, was designed to clear itself of snow and there was no particular need for workers to clear snow from the roof, the mayor said. The market was built in 1974.

The Interfax news agency reported the market was designed by Nodar Kancheli, the same architect who drafted the plans for Moscow's Transvaal water park, where the roof collapsed in February 2004, killing 28 people. Prosecutors have blamed that collapse on design flaws.

Kancheli came to the market after the collapse and was later questioned by investigators, Russian news agencies reported. He said possibilities for the collapse were a buildup of snow, the addition of kiosks on the mezzanine or corrosion.