8 survive as Hanoi villa collapses amid downpour

The villa, located on a land plot spanning over 5,000 sq.m, began to fall apart at 5 a.m. The beams snapped, while the walls began to crack and crumble.

 

 

8 survive as Hanoi villa collapses amid downpour

Biệt thự lưng đồi sập, 8 người thoát nạn

Dinh Cong Thang, 31, the villa’s owner, said at around 4:30 a.m., while it was raining heavily, a family member was awakened by a loud noise behind the house. This person called Thang to check out what happened, and he saw water and soil rolling down from the hillside.

Thang then called his family and told them to evacuate to a relative’s house, about a kilometer away.

“After I brought my family out, I returned home and saw that the house was gradually collapsing. We didn’t have enough time to move any of the belongings out,” he said.

The villa was built by Thang in May 2021, with its back facing a hillside. The villa costs VND3 billion ($118,296). The house continued to sink in on itself by the afternoon, with the ceiling getting closer to the ground.

A villa that has collapsed in Hanoi’s Quoc Oai District, July 24, 2024. Photo by VnExpress/Gia Chinh

The hill located behind the villa is about 300 m high. It is situated far away from residential areas, with several trees on it. As the rains continued, water kept rushing down from the hilltop.

Besides Thang’s house, there are three other houses on the hill. Authorities have evacuated the people living there to safer areas, and barricaded the site to prevent people from getting near.

Quoc Oai District is among the localities feeling the impacts of Storm Prapiroon, recording rainfall of up to 330 mm from 7 p.m. Tuesday to 5 a.m. Wednesday, according to the National Center for Hydro-Meteorological Forecasting. Water levels in several rivers also rose, inundating hundreds of houses.

Storm Prapiroon made landfall in the northern province of Quang Ninh on Tuesday morning and quickly weakend to a tropical depression, but still causing rains across the northern region.