Five people were killed when part of the roof collapsed at a new terminal at Charles de
Gaulle airport in Paris today, triggering a search for trapped survivors and questions about the showcase building's safety.
Rescue workers said another person was unlikely to survive and three others were badly hurt.
Most of the victims were passengers.
Slabs of concrete, metal and glass crashed down onto a waiting area in terminal 2E just before 6 a.m. (Irish time) shortly after passengers noticed cracks in the ceiling.
The accident brought down a 50-metre long, 30-metre wide section of the tunnel-like building.
The collapse happened just 11 months after the terminal opened following several construction delays.
"Time is a factor. We have to get to the injured as quickly as possible," fire brigade spokesman Mr Laurent Vibert said as rescue workers with sniffer dogs searched through the rubble.
"It's like a scene after an earthquake," said another firefighter at the airport at Roissy, northeast of the centre of Paris.
Police started evacuating and sealing off the area soon after passengers alerted them to the cracks and dust falling from the futuristic domed roof perforated with small windows.
Planes were arriving from Newark in the United States and Johannesburg at the time, and one was leaving for Prague. The injured included one person from China and one from Ivory Coast.
The Interior Ministry and local officials initially said six people were killed, but fire officials later said five had been confirmed dead and a sixth was expected to be.
It was not clear if that person was badly hurt or was missing.
The French government ruled out a terror attack but said the cause of the accident was unknown.