City of Galveston building inspectors investigating after fatal balcony collapse on West End A Houston woman died over the weekend following a partial balcony collapse at her Galveston West End beach home on Friday (6/14/2024). Susan Farb Morris and another person were injured when a beach-side balcony of the house in the 19000 block of East Kahala Road in the Kahala Beach Estate collapsed at around 2:15 PM. The pair were taken to the emergency center at UTMB Health’s John Sealy Hospital. At the time, Galveston firefighters and EMS who responded did not have any indication that Morris’ injuries were life-threatening. Initial information was that she was talking and communicating with emergency personnel. However, her medical condition took a turn, and she died about 7 hours later, Galveston County Medical Examiner’s Officer Chief Investigator John Florence said. The cause of death was initially determined to be blunt force trauma, Florence said. Over the weekend, when contacted by i45NOW, neither Galveston Police nor Fire Department or Jamaica Beach Fire could find a balcony collapse call in their call records. It wasn’t until Monday that officials were able to confirm the fatality. Even then, officials could not confirm the call or details for several hours. Galveston police were not called to the scene because the incident was listed as a medical call, and there was no incident to investigate. Galveston Communications Director Marissa Barnett said that now that it has been confirmed to be a fatal incident, building inspectors will be out on Tuesday to inspect the structure.

Posted by i45NOW at 2024-06-18 02:17:36 UTC