A worker "fell 115 feet to his death" from the roof of the Arena Amazonia in Brazil on Saturday, the fifth fatal accident during construction of Brazil's 12 World Cup stadiums, according to Bruno Kelly of REUTERS. Local media later reported that "another worker had died of a heart attack at a convention centre next to the stadium in Manaus." The building "will be used to host meeting during the World Cup." The state's public prosecutor's office "asked a judge to suspend work on the Manaus stadium until safe working conditions could be guaranteed, though such requests are not often granted in Brazil." Marcleudo de Melo Ferreira, 22, died in a hospital in Manaus around 4am. He "fell nearly 35 meters (115 feet) after a cable broke and became the fifth person to die while building the World Cup stadiums" (REUTERS, 12/15). In London, Jack de Menezes reported Brazilian firm Andrade Gutierrez, responsible for building the stadium in Manuas which is situated in the Amazonian region of Brazil, has said in a statement that "Ferreira worked for a company that had been contracted by them to build the arena roof, and confirmed that a full internal investigation would be launched" (INDEPENDENT, 12/14).
DOWNPLAYING THE PROBLEMS: REUTERS' Mike Collett wrote Brazil's "troubled buildup" to the 2014 World Cup continued on Saturday. Officials "moved to downplay a strike of 300 workers at the stadium in Curitiba." Miguel Capobiango, the coordinator for UGP Copa, the umbrella coordination organization for all World Cup projects in Manaus, said on a site visit last Wednesday that construction time on the stadium "had been increased and workers were now operating in three shifts for all but four hours a day." Atlético Paranaense Exec Marketing Dir Mauro Holzmann, whose team will play at the stadium after the World Cup, told reporters at a news conference at the stadium on Saturday that the strike "would be settled by Monday." Holzmann: "It was a small problem, a misunderstanding and it won't happen again. We had trouble getting access to government funds to pay the workers. Put it down to Brazilian bureaucracy" (REUTERS, 12/15).
