Berkeley balcony collapse: Victims fell 40ft to deaths from fourth-floor

News of the tragedy which has claimed the lives of six Irish people and left a number of others seriously injured first emerged when the Berkeley Police Department received an emergency call at 12.41am local time (8.41am Irish time).

As of last night, three women and three men were known to have been killed in the tragedy, with one of the victims understood to be of dual Irish-American citizenship and local to the area. It is understood two of the female victims were cousins.

A spokesman for the Berkeley PD said he was not sure who first raised the alarm, and that it could have been a call from a passer-by. A balcony on the fourth floor of the Library Gardens apartment building at 2020 Kittredge St, opposite the Berkeley Public Library in the downtown area, had collapsed. Photographs of the scene show the balcony having peeled off the building, rolling onto a balcony below.