An explosion caused by a gas leak in a residential building has killed at least nine people, including four kids.
The blast happened on the Russian territory island of Sakhalin, which is in the Pacific Ocean, just north of Japan.
A gas cylinder erupted in one of the apartments at around 5.30am local time this morning.
Ambulance crews are reportedly working in the courtyard of the house and surgeons are operating on the victims close to the scene, according to local site tvzvezda.
Emergency responders are searching through the rubble in case there are more bodies trapped. More than 50 people, including volunteers, are involved in the operation.
Thirty-three people were known to have lived in the building but three are still unaccounted for, reports say.
Drones and helicopters were used to help find the victims, according to tvzvezda,
Sakhalin Governor Valery Limarenko announced news of the tragedy on Telegram.
"The group of people and special equipment involved in the removal of the rubble of a house in Tymovskoye has been increased. At the moment, 59 people and 13 pieces of equipment are working there," he wrote on his Telegram channel.
The official said those affected will be moved to temporary accommodation.
Families who have lost their homes completely will receive compensation to the tune of 500,000 roubles (£6,908).
And for relatives who've lost family members, they could receive one million roubles (£13,816), he claimed.
The explosion mirrors a similar incident in 2018 when four people, including a child, died and dozens more were initially reported missing when a gas explosion tore down a block of flats in Russia.
Emergency services rescued dozens of people feared buried at the residential block in industrial city Magnitogorsk.
A gas explosion on the upper floor caused the 2018 New Year’s Eve horror.
Three people were confirmed dead - including one child - but the toll was expected to rise.
According to reports in Russia, 79 people were missing.
Several hundred rescuers were scrambling to pull adults and children from the debris after the building collapsed “like a house of cards”.
Yesterday a huge fire broke out during a birthday party in the Gaza strip with 21 members of the same family killed.
Victims of a blaze that tore through a top-floor apartment in the occupied Palestinian territory were related, two of their relatives confirmed.
Officials in Hamas-run Gaza said last night's blaze in a three-storey residential building in Jabaliya refugee camp was apparently fuelled by stored petrol.
They said it was not clear how the petrol ignited, but an investigation is underway.
It was one of the deadliest incidents in Gaza in recent years outside the violence stemming from the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
The fire destroyed the top-floor apartment in the building, home to the Abu Raya family.
