The funerals held after the collapse of the scaffolding kill 36

One day after the joyful celebration of a religious festival, an Orthodox Christian church in the small Ethiopian town of Areter organized mass funeral for the 36 faithful killed when scaffolding inside the building collapsed.

Hundreds of mourning people walked with coffins draped in colored fabric in the church complex Mariam while the clerics led funeral rituals.

Among them, Fikre Tilahun, 22, told the BBC that he had lost his mother in the tragedy.

“It is difficult to lose your mother, very difficult,” he said.

The faithful had gathered at the church, about 70 km (45 miles) from the capital Addis Ababa, Wednesday as part of the annual Christian celebration of St Mary.

Eyewitness Gebreweld Tesfaye told the BBC that a large number of worshipers had decided to climb on makeshift scaffolding to see a newly painted fresco in the church ceiling when the disaster struck.

“The staircase was entirely made of wood, and there were many people who moved upstairs at the time. While the faithful went, the wooden structure gave in, leading to collapse,” said Gebreweld.

Other eyewitnesses have said that chaos followed, while people dispersed in panic or were trying to save the lives of people trapped under the rubble.

Mr. Fikre told the BBC that as soon as he heard of the disaster, he rushed to the church, then to a health center to look for his mother, but she was not in any of the two places.

“My cousin called me after that. And then I went to the hospital. His body was there,” said Fikre.

It was among the 36 dead, the emergency services saying that the number of deaths could increase while some of the injured, about 200 in number, were in critical condition. Some of them were transferred to Addis Ababa for treatment.

The archbishop of the local diocese, Megabi Hadis Nekatibeb, described the disaster as “incredibly tragic and heartbreaking”.

Mr. Fikre said life would not be the same for him and his younger brother without their mother.

“She raised us by doing and selling Tella (a locally brewed alcohol),” he told the BBC.

The government expressed condolences to relatives of the victims and said that “security should be a priority” during all construction projects.

Health and safety regulations are poorly applied to Ethiopia and construction disasters are common.