ALLSTON, MASS. (WHDH) - Gino Jacobs is one of the two men who rushed over to help a woman trapped when the facade of a building on Harvard Avenue came crashing down Sunday.
“I still have her face in my mind, all the blood,” Jacobs said. “Me and the guy, we pulled the rocks out. Her legs were underneath. Everything was underneath.”
Jacobs says the unconscious woman was covered by the chunks of brick and stone.
“Something fell hard, like boom, and all the smoke came out,” Jacobs said.
The partial collapse brought down the outside wall and sign of Common Ground Bar and Grill.
“It was like thunder,” owner Bob O’Guin said. “The Patriots game was not on yet. (We’re) so lucky because there would have been more people.”
Authorities say a second person was injured, but no one inside the restaurant was hurt.
Inspectors and engineers returned to Harvard Avenue on Monday in the hopes of determining what caused the front facade of a one-story commercial building to come crashing down onto the sidewalk.
After an investigation, Boston Inspectional Services Commissioner William “Buddy” Christopher Jr. said the cause was likely long-term water damage coupled with unusually windy conditions over the weekend.
“As water works its way into a masonry joint, and then it freezes and expands, it sometimes can compromise the mortar joints, so it makes a bigger opening and then a little more water gets in,” Christopher said. “The damage that was done to the building is not structurally compromising the building at all.”
Christopher also said everything that failed was on the exterior of the building and he hopes to have the businesses that occupy the building back open by the end of the week.
Jacobs says he spent the last 24 hours thinking about the woman he helped save.
“I hope she is OK,” he said. “That’s what I want to know that she is OK.”
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