Rescue workers continue to clear the debris of the 10-story hotel that collapsed this week in the Buenos Aires Province coastal town of Villa Gesell. The death toll reached three in the early hours of Saturday when another body was recovered, and the number of arrests mounted to six after police detained the architect allegedly in charge of unauthorized renovations on the hotel. 

At least five people remain missing, and a woman was hospitalized after being rescued alive on Tuesday.

Buenos Aires Province’s Civil Defense identified Nahuel Stefanic as the third victim of Tuesday’s collapse, which brought 650 rescue workers who converged from all over the country to Villa Gesell. Stefanic was the nephew of the Dubrovnik Hotel’s former owner, María Rosa Stefanic. She was found dead on Thursday by rescue teams. 

Stefanic’s girlfriend, Dana Desimone, is one of at least five who are still missing. Others include four men living in the hotel while under contract for renovation work that was underway. 

“The rescue operation only stops once the last piece of debris has been removed and only when we are sure that there are no remaining victims,” said Fabián García, head of the province’s Civil Defense.

The first victim, Federico Ciocchini, was found on Tuesday, hours after the incident. He was an elderly man who owned an apartment in an adjacent building that was also destroyed by the hotel’s collapse. He had arrived there the previous day with his wife, who was rescued alive. They were planning to prepare the apartment to rent out over the summer.

On Sunday, 300 firefighters will arrive in Villa Gesell to replace some of the 650 rescue workers who have been removing debris manually since Tuesday. Rescue dogs, drones, helicopters, and cranes are also being used to find the missing.

Architect arrested

An architect who was allegedly responsible for renovations on the hotel was arrested on Saturday, under suspicion that those works caused the structural failure.

A group of builders and contractors had been hired for informal construction work at the back of the building, where the collapse began, according to a press release on the Villa Gesell municipality website. The construction work had not been approved by the local authorities and did not meet municipal guidelines — the municipality had ordered the renovations to cease in August.

However, according to the press release, renovations continued with or without permits. As well as disregarding municipality orders to stop working on the back of the building, authorized renovations of the front also got underway. Authorities highlighted that the front remained intact, and the authorized construction work would not appear to have caused the collapse.

Five construction workers who were able to escape before the hotel collapsed have also been arrested. Two of them said the architect was in charge from July to September, after which he stopped going to the hotel and was replaced by another architect, according to local media reports.

Authorities also searched the home and company of the current owner of the hotel, who had bought it from María Rosa Stefanic in April. The hotel was a family business founded by a Croatian couple in 1986. Despite having sold it, Stefanic decided to remain living in the hotel to supervise renovations and help the new owner manage the hotel throughout the summer.

According to the Herald’s sister publication Ámbito, the new proprietor also owns the busy Liniers bus terminal in Buenos Aires City and several other hotels and is known to carry out extensive renovation work on the new properties.

“She had recently become a widow, and she was tired,” said Jorge Cocco, a friend of Stefanic and director of the Villa Gesell Hotel, Coffee Shops and Restaurants Association, in an interview with TN news channel on Wednesday.