BAD REICHENHALL (Germany), Jan 3: Up to 15 people, including children, were killed or feared dead after the roof of a skating rink in southern Germany collapsed in heavy snow, police and officials said on Tuesday.

Schools in the region were on holiday and many children and their parents were inside the building in the Bavarian town of Bad Reichenhall, by the Austrian border, when the roof, weighed down by masses of snow, fell in on Monday.

Rescuers worked through the night, lifting away half of the collapsed structure. By early morning they had identified the bodies of nine people — a woman, two teenagers and six children aged between nine and 12.

Hubertus Andrae, police director of the nearby town of Traunstein, told a news conference that another six people were known to be buried in the wreckage and that another three were believed to be missing.

Relatives faced an agonizing wait as rescuers with sniffer dogs and heavy cranes worked in bitter cold through the night to clear masses of snow and debris, but there were few signs of life coming from under the piles of rubble.

Police denied reports of knocking coming from under the collapsed roof.

“It’s unfortunately deathly quiet in the hall,” a spokesman said.

Officials said around 50 people were thought to have been in the sports complex when the roof collapsed. Around 30 were injured and several others escaped from the collapse unscathed.

Relatives of the victims and missing were receiving counselling in a makeshift tent set up in front of the rink.

Rescue work was hampered by driving snow and by the danger that large lumps of concrete and twisted metal could collapse on emergency services—Reuters