Cologne rescuers advance towards rubble of archives

Mar 4, 2009, 10:52 GMT

The site of the collapsed Historic City Archive pictured in Cologne, Germany, 04 March 2009. A few people are yet reported missing. The archive and two neighbouring houses collapsed the previous day on 03 March, possibly as a consequence of nearby construction works to enhance Cologne\'s tube system. EPA/OLIVER BERG

   Cologne, Germany - Rescuers resumed work Wednesday to clear the rubble of the City of Cologne Archives, a treasure-house containing 1,000 years of German history, one day after its sudden collapse.

Stefan Neuhoff, head of the Cologne fire brigade, said two men who had lived in two flats in a neighbouring building were still missing.

No bodies have been found. All the archive staff and users ran to safety within three minutes Tuesday after the walls began to groan and buckle. Three buildings then tipped into a giant pothole which opened up under the street in front of it.

Neuhoff said the heap of masonry and ancient books and manuscripts was being covered with plastic sheeting to protect it from rain, in the expectation that many of the records could be recovered and repaired after rubble removal begins later.

Georg Quander, the city's head of culture, said the documents at the bottom of the pothole were at gravest risk, as the area had begun to fill up with ground water.

He said only a part of the documents had been microfilmed for posterity before the disaster, and digital imaging of the collection had barely begun before the disaster.

'This was the memory of the whole Rhineland and more,' he said. For centuries Cologne was the principal city of the Rhine valley.

The archives, which had six levels above ground and two below, were described as the richest municipal record collection in northern continental Europe, including unique decrees by medieval emperors, centuries of merchants' records and scholars' private papers.

Empty spaces in the pothole would be filled by Wednesday afternoon, but Neuhoff said the pile of rubble was not safe for rescuers to touch yet.

Two neighbouring buildings would have to be demolished first because they threatened to collapse on the disaster site. The demolition could not be completed before Thursday night, he said.

He added that the chances of finding the two missing men alive were 'almost zero.' Guido Kahlen, a Cologne city official, said, 'We can only hope they were not home at the time.'

One neighbour, Heiko Wegener, escaped after part of his block had already tumbled down. 'I scrambled out a window,' he said.

The pothole developed when soil suddenly spilled into excavations for an underground train line. The archives were built in 1971 and contained 26,000 metres of shelving, according to a city website.

The mayor of Cologne, Fritz Schramma, called for the rail project to be abandoned. Only 200 metres away, a Catholic church steeple began to tip over in 2004 after a similar mishap, but was jacked up straight again.

   But Juergen Fenske, head of the Cologne public-transport company KVB, said construction would continue. 'We know fairly well what happened. But we don't know yet why it happened,' he said.

Neuhoff said the archives building itself had been sound but 'the ground it was standing on was pulled away from under it.'

Rescuers cannot approach the disaster site from the street because of damage to the train tunnel below, so they must advance from another street via the archives' back yard, Neuhoff said.

Firefighters removed ancient records overnight from an annexe basement that was not damaged in the disaster.