Public Safety

Brooklyn building collapse kills 8; city blames unsafe construction next door and orders probe of 100 sites

Brooklyn, New York • November 12, 2026 • By Press Pass USA

Firefighters search the rubble of a collapsed brick apartment building in Brooklyn in the rain as an excavator clears debris

Illustration: Press Pass USA

Eight people, including two children, were killed when a three-story apartment building in Brooklyn collapsed into an adjacent construction site, and New York City officials said Thursday the collapse was caused by "unsafe construction operations at the adjacent property."

The building at 1321 Flatbush Ave. in the Flatbush neighborhood came down around 4 p.m. Wednesday, falling into an excavation pit next door at 2625 Bedford Ave. The collapse also destroyed a wall of an adjacent residential block, exposing a staircase, closets and a bedroom, officials said.

Six people were found dead in the wreckage and two others died later from their injuries, city officials said. Two of those killed were children, and two were construction workers. Two Ecuadoreans were among the dead. Eighteen people were injured, including four firefighters who led the rescue effort.

The building, built in 1930, had four residential units and was home to several immigrant families, Mayor Zohran Mamdani said. More than 250 firefighters and emergency medical workers responded, and rescue crews kept working through torrential rain on Thursday, searching for anyone still trapped.

"We will be here until we are 100% sure there are no more people trapped," Fire Department Commissioner Lillian Bonsignore told reporters. "We always assume that there are more people there until we can access the ground."

Excavation work was underway at the neighboring site when the building fell. An official notice filed by a construction company in September said the earthwork included "rock blasting," according to city records. Developers at the site were seeking to build a nine-story mixed-use building with a grocery store and housing above, though only a three-story building had been approved.

The site had drawn city enforcement before the collapse. A stop-work order was issued in March when inspectors found a building being demolished without adequate overhead protection, and a city summons followed in April after demolition work continued despite the order. A March buildings department report also flagged cracks in the facade of the building that later collapsed. Officials said the department's finding does not establish that the earlier stop-work violation itself caused the collapse.

On Thursday, Mamdani ordered the city to examine five companies associated with the adjacent construction site and about 100 more sites connected with those entities. Municipal building inspectors fanned out across the city to inspect the other sites the same day.

"If there is anyone or any entity operating in this city that bears responsibility for what happened, we will hold them fully accountable," Mamdani said at a press conference near the site.

Three other addresses on the same side of the street were ordered vacated as a precaution until safety inspections could be conducted, officials said.

Sources: Reuters, "New York City building collapse kills 8; mayor expands probe" (Nov. 12, 2026, full text verified); NorthJersey.com / USA TODAY Network, "Brooklyn building collapse cause identified: What NYC officials found" (Nov. 12, 2026, full text verified); New York Post, "Excavation work eyed as potential cause of devastating Brooklyn building collapse that killed 8" (Nov. 12, 2026). Event date verified: November 12, 2026 (Thursday developments; the collapse occurred Wednesday, November 11).