The French Securite deployed heavy machinery and trained dogs into the collapsed building as a final attempt to rescue potential survivors. The rescue team dug the building up from the ground to the fifth floor on 19 December 1993 and found 29 decomposed bodies near the staircase of the third through fifth floors. Ten additional bodies were later recovered from the scene. Army staff began preparing for the demolition of the unaffected and evacuated Block 2 after finding it unsafe for further occupation.