Barcelona sports center collapse kills at least 3

By MANU FERNANDEZ, Associated Press Writer

BARCELONA, Spain – Part of a sports center collapsed in high winds, killing at least three children and trapping and injuring others in the northern city of Barcelona, officials said Saturday.

An official with the region's Interior Ministry said "many children" were trapped in the debris, without offering specific figures. She spoke on condition of anonymity under agency rules.

State television broadcaster TVE said in its early afternoon news bulletin that children were preparing to go out and play on a baseball field when the accident happened.

The local newspaper La Vanguardia reported, citing unnamed municipal officials, that 16 other people were injured, two seriously. It did not say how many were children.

A woman who said she had seen the accident told Spanish national broadcaster TVE that the children were preparing to play on a baseball field when they took shelter under a viewing stand with a corrugated metal roof. A photograph on La Vanguardia's Web site showed emergency workers gathered around a collapsed brick wall and iron roof.

Freak weather conditions have cause winds to gust to 160 kph (100 mph) in many places throughout Spain.

A woman died when a wall fell on her in Barcelona and a traffic officer was killed by a falling tree in northwest Galicia.

The powerful storm also lashed southwestern France, with the state-run electricity generator reporting about a million homes without power and rail authorities halting traffic in the region.

Heavy rain and winds pounded the coast south of Bordeaux, and the city faced winds of up to 160 kilometers per hour.

French TV showed images including downed power cables, uprooted trees lying across roads, a car crushed under a collapsed wall, and a traffic light post that toppled over.

In Bordeaux's Gironde region, rescuers evacuated 19 residents of a retirement home after its rooftop was swept away. Authorities also evacuated campers from the pine forests in the sandy Landes region to the south.

All flights in Bordeaux and Toulouse were temporarily halted, and authorities in the region ordered a halt to tractor-trailer and tour bus traffic. The national railway operator stopped trains throughout the area.

Authorities in Toulouse ordered public parks shut. Some ski slopes in the south of the area hit were closed. France's national meteorological service said no letup was expected before mid-afternoon Saturday.