Six people remained in critical condition and one person was believed still missing, a day after a blast ripped through a building in central Paris, the city's public prosecution office said.
Yesterday afternoon an explosion tore through a building on Saint-Jacques Street in the 5th district, close to the Luxembourg Gardens and at the edge of the Latin Quarter, a top tourism area in the French capital.
"These figures may still change," prosecutor Maylis De Roeck told Reuters in a text message, adding that around 50 people had been injured in the blast, which set buildings a blaze and caused the front of one to collapse onto the street.
Of two people initially believed missing, one has been found in hospital and is being taken care of, the prosecutor said, adding: "Searches are ongoing to find the second person."
Authorities have not yet said what caused the explosion, which witnesses said had followed a strong smell of gas at the site.
The blast blew out windows up to 400m away, and was followed by a major fire which caused the building, housing a fashion school, to collapse.
Some 70 fire trucks and 270 firefighters battled the blaze before it was contained.
Early today, the security cordon had been reduced, allowing journalists and onlookers closer to the heap of rubble in front of the structure.
A single fire hose was still spraying the remains of the building now and then, while some shops had reopened on the street of the blast.
The mayor of the 5th district said a gas explosion was behind the collapse, but this has not yet been confirmed by other officials.
Some witnesses reported noticing a strong smell of gas in the street before the explosion, but officials said they did not have enough evidence to determine the cause of the blast with certainty.
An investigation into the causes was launched immediately, prosecutors said.
Florence Berthout, mayor of the Paris district where the blast occurred, said the 12 students who should have been in the design school's classrooms when the blast occurred had fortunately gone to visit an exhibition with their teacher.
"Otherwise the (death toll) could have been absolutely horrific," Ms Berthout told BFM TV, adding that three children who had been passing by at the time were among the injured, although their lives were not in danger.
There have been several incidents of gas-related blasts in the French capital.
In January 2019, a suspected leak in a buried gas pipe destroyed a building on the Rue de Trevise in the ninth district, killing four people including two firefighters.
The shockwave blew out scores of nearby windows, and dozens of families were forced to evacuate their homes for months.
Much of the street still remains off limits four years after the disaster.
