Nairobi rescue teams reconcile missing-person reports after Eastleigh building collapse

Rescue teams are still searching the rubble of a building that collapsed in Nairobi’s Eastleigh district on Friday, October 23, while officials and the Kenya Red Cross work to establish how many people may still be inside. Interior Cabinet Secretary Kipchumba Murkomen said seven people believed to have been in 11 occupied shops on the building’s ground floor and basement were unaccounted for. All 67 construction workers at the site had been located: 66 escaped unharmed and one was injured, according to his update reported by [Daily Nation](https://beta.nation.co.ke/kenya/counties/nairobi/67-workers-accounted-for-seven-people-missing-5643764). The Red Cross has received 31 missing-person reports, but said it is checking them with families. Some reports concern workers who later returned home, and two people have already been reunited with relatives. That figure is a caseload of reports, not confirmation that 31 people remain trapped. The distinction matters as responders clear debris and try to reach the building’s lower levels. [The Eastleigh Voice](https://eastleighvoice.co.ke/headlines/415736/31-reported-missing-after-eastleigh-building-collapse-red-cross) reported the Red Cross update. The cause has not been established. Nairobi Governor Johnson Sakaja said county records showed that an application for a building of more than 15 floors with a basement had been submitted but never approved, according to the same local report. That raises a regulatory question; it does not by itself establish why the structure failed. Reuters confirmed the building was under construction and that people may have been trapped; investigations are ongoing ([Reuters](https://www.reuters.com/world/africa/building-collapses-kenyan-capital-rescuers-scene-2026-10-23/)).