Dramatic photos show where a row of formwork collapsed near a busy road in central Tāmaki Makaurau/Auckland on Wednesday.
Fire crews were called to the incident on Epsom's Manukau Rd just after 2pm, a Fire and Emergency spokesperson told Newshub.
Staff worked with lines teams to secure the collapsed panels throughout the afternoon, they added.
A police spokesperson told Newshub on Wednesday evening there " was some concern it may also fall onto the road."
Emergency services closed a section of Manukau Rd between Green Lane West and Pah Rd for a period and Auckland Transport said bus routes 30 and 309 had to take detours during the road closure.
Police initially described the collapsed structure as scaffolding, but on Thursday WorkSafe said “it appears the panels collapsed independent of the scaffolding.”
Formwork panels are generally used for molding concrete.
WorkSafe said inspectors were sent to the site on Thursday to make initial enquiries.
“WorkSafe has today issued a non-disturbance notice, requiring the site owner to get an engineer to make a safety assessment, and provide us with a report,” it said in a statement.
The collapse at the site of a troubled under-construction apartment block called the Epsom Central Apartments. Construction work stopped there in 2019 when monitoring staff from Auckland Council found it didn't comply with its building consent.
The partnership who launched the apartment project was placed into receivership two years ago, owing more than $13 million to lenders and construction company contractors.
Developer Shane Xin Zhou appeared to have vanished at the time, Stuff reported in September.
The incident comes four months after a row of four-storey scaffolding was captured on video collapsing into the path of travelling cars on Peach Parade in nearby Ellerslie.
Following that, there were calls for tighter regulations for scaffolding, with WorkSafe saying at the time there needed to be significant change in how the construction industry operates.
EDITOR'S NOTE: This article was updated after WorkSafe confirmed the scaffolding on the Manukau Rd site had not collapsed.
