A Brazilian politician filming a video about the dangerous disrepair at a local bridge narrowly escaped as the bridge collapsed and plunged into the river right before his eyes — and managed to capture the moment on video.
At least one person died in the collapse and 15 others are still missing.
Elias Júnior, a councilman for the city of Aguiarnópolis in northern Brazil, had been recording a video about the sorry state of a roadway bridge on Sunday afternoon when the asphalt began to buckle and crack behind him.
A large section of the bridge suddenly gave way, sending the official and his cameraman fleeing for their lives, the video shows.
After sprinting clear of the bridge, the pair kept rolling and walked back to the scene to discover that nearly the entire structure had gone down — taking at least eight vehicles with it.
Brazilian Minister of Transport Renan Filho has declared a state of emergency as rescuers scramble to rescue survivors from the collapse, Brazilian news outlet Globo reported.
But rescue efforts stalled when authorities learned that a chemical truck spilled a full tank of sulfuric acid into the water when it went down.
“We need to know the quality of the water so that we can deploy our diving teams, which are already here,” Col. Magnum Coelho, a colonel for the fire department, told reporters in Portuguese.
“Many people were talking about the cracks in [the bridge]. I came to show it, but I didn’t imagine that at that moment of filming the bridge would collapse,” Councilman Júnior told Globo in Portuguese.
“I’m still in shock, in disbelief. … We left in despair with our hands on our heads,” he recalled.
