Houses in ruins

Explosion in Bavaria: 17-year-old recovered dead

Following the explosion in a residential building in the Bavarian town of Memmingen on Friday evening, the body of a 17-year-old has been recovered from the rubble. 

Emergency services found the missing teenager dead in a neighboring house, which was also badly damaged, a police spokesman said on Saturday night. The building in Bavarian Swabia was reduced to rubble after an explosion.

A 68-year-old resident of the house, who was also initially searched for, was not in the house when the explosion occurred.

Video: Explosion in residential building

Building massively damaged
The surrounding buildings were massively damaged by the detonation at around 5.20 pm. The situation center spoke of a "huge amount of damage" and an "enormous amount of rubble" that first had to be removed. An excavator from the Federal Agency for Technical Relief (THW) was deployed for this purpose.

Operation underway
A large-scale operation by police and rescue workers is underway in the city. Emergency services from nearby Baden-Württemberg are also on site. A helicopter was circling over the town and the police set up a media assembly point in the early hours of the evening.