The collapse at the start of the Easter weekend came during a storm that caused flooding and power outages, and ripped the roofs off buildings.
CAPE TOWN, South Africa — A church building in eastern South Africa partially collapsed at the start of the Easter weekend, killing at least 13 people and injuring 16, during heavy rainfall that caused flooding, power outages and structural damage.
A wall caved in at the Pentecostal Holiness Church in Dlangubo, a small village in KwaZulu-Natal province, shortly after 10 p.m. on Thursday, according to Robert McKenzie, a spokesman for the province’s emergency medical services department.
“There was an electrical storm in the area and it might have contributed,” Mr. McKenzie said of the disaster, which took place three days after a devastating fire ripped through the Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris and caused extensive damage to one of the city’s most famous landmarks.
