Around 12:30 a.m. Saturday, the second and third floor balcony of an apartment on St. Andrews Lane in the Highlands Plantation collapsed, injuring 15 people.
Reportedly, around 15 to 16 individuals were on the second floor of the balcony that collapsed, bringing the third floor balcony down on top of it. No one was reported being on the third floor.
Amidst the occurrence of the incident, neighbors across the street heard the balconies collapse and described it as sounding like “loud thunder.”
Hunter Kovac, sophomore agricultural science major and individual across the street at the moment, said he and others across the street had been invited to party with the victims earlier that night, an offer in which they declined.
“They were playing music and it was really loud. We were sitting there when we just heard this loud noise and we ran to the door and this guy was hollering for help,” Kovac said. “We had to pick the first deck up, because there were people under it, and we had to pick the second one up with the first one. After we made sure everyone was out from underneath the balcony, we started helping people who were hurt.”
According to Kovac, too many people were on the second floor balcony which collapsed, in turn bringing the connected third floor balcony down with it. Kovac said the scene contained a considerable amount of blood.
“I had blood on my hands too. There was one girl who broke her hip or something and she couldn’t feel it and she was in shock,” Kovac said. “After she came to her senses, her hip was dislocated. If the balconies do not have weight capacities, they definitely need to. I’m pretty sure they do and there is probably something in their contract that says so many people can stand on balcony at one time, because I’m not sure how old those balconies are.”
After urging the injured victims to stay awake, Kovac said a lot of people on the scene (those injured and those not injured) were in shock and not sure of what to do.
“There was another guy who I was assisting and I asked if he could move his feet,” he said. “He said he could but that his head hurt. I kept telling him not to go to sleep. It’s something I wouldn’t put on anybody, especially at school. We did everything we could to help, because they really needed help. We provided some people with water.”
Maribeth Morgan, sophomore whose major is undeclared and neighbor across the street, said the incident was a surreal experience to witness.
“We heard the bang and that’s when we opened the door and just saw people screaming. It was awful. They had chairs on the balcony and when it fell, the chairs like went into the road,” Morgan said. “It was truly like something out of a movie.”
