Specially-trained fire officers rescued a man who was trapped in a collapsed trench on a construction site next to the Blackwall Tunnel approach on Tuesday.

The man was trapped up to his chest in sand and clay on the site at Bramshot Avenue in Charlton, where a developer has permission to build nine flats.

A 32-metre ladder was deployed to the scene as urban search and rescue officers together with a London Ambulance crew  worked for six hours to free the man, who was taken to hospital by paramedics. 

“Crews worked methodically to extract the trapped man, excavating sad and clay from the trench to increase access,” the London Fire Brigade said in a statement. “As they did this, steps were taken to shore up and stabilise the trench to prevent any further collapse.”

Fire crews at work in trench
Specifically-trained fire and ambulance officers were called to the scene. Image: London Fire Brigade

Firefighters from as far away as Bethnal Green attended the scene. Police and the Health and Safety Executive are investigating.

It is not clear what was happening on the site. Planning permission was given in February 2019 for a five-storey block of nine flats on the site, which overlooks the Blackwall Tunnel approach and is next to the northern entrance to the Blackheath rail tunnel. Only one person objected to the proposal and the matter was decided by a planning officer rather than by councillors. 

Render of proposed flats
Plans to build on the site were approved in 2019. Image: Greenwich Property Investments Ltd/Avaa

In what the council itself called “an obvious error”, Greenwich planning officers did not attach a time limit to the permission, with a three-year deadline belatedly added in March 2022 when the developer asked to amend the scheme. A construction plan was refused in May last year. 

Previous plans for the site had been refused, in part because the site, which is up a hill from a police car pound, was deemed to be an employment site. But a planning inspector overturned one refusal in 2015, opening the way for development on the land.

Empty land on Bramshot Avenue
The site is leftover land from the construction of the Blackwall Tunnel approach Image: The Greenwich Wire

The site has been vacant since the Blackwall Tunnel approach was built in the late 1960s, severing Bramshot Avenue and neighbouring Siebert Road.

Photographs and maps from before the A102’s construction show that the site was part of a row of terraced shops that was flattened to make way for the new road.