[FONT=Verdana]Two workers were in the middle of a conversation Monday morning when large chunks of concrete fell from the 19th floor of the Mercantile complex in downtown Dallas, killing them. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]Police spokeswoman Cpl. Jamie Matthews said the debris was knocked loose about 9:30 a.m. by a Bobcat front-end loader operating on the 19th floor of the historic building. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]Police had initially reported that the men were crushed when a large claw-like device fell from the building along with concrete. But Matthews later said that they were killed by large slabs of concrete. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]The victims were having a conversation when the material fell on them, Matthews said. One man was in the cab of a tractor-trailer rig, the other was standing nearby, she said. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]The truck driver was Edgar Omar Navarro Santos, 34, of Dallas, said a spokeswoman for the Dallas County Medical Examiner's Office. The other man was Keyvin Oliva, 21, also of Dallas, who died later at Baylor Medical Center. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]The 31-story Mercantile National Bank building, 1704 Main St., opened with a distinctive clock tower in 1942. The "Merc'' complex, however, expanded to four buildings and eventually occupied an entire block bound by Main, Commerce, St. Paul and Ervay streets. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]In 1992, the original Merc building was abandoned, and it soon fell into disrepair. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]Last year, however, Cleveland-based Forest City Enterprises agreed to convert it into apartments and retail shops. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]The massive renovation project has been called the lynchpin of Dallas' downtown redevelopment efforts. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]Part of the project involves the demolition of the three other buildings on the block to make way for more multifamily housing. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]Matthews said the demolition work is being handled by Cleveland Wrecking Company, based in Covina, Calif. Officials for that company were unavailable for comment Monday. [/FONT]
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[FONT=Verdana]The incident is being investigated by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, said Kathryn Delaney, director of the agency's Dallas office. She added that no other information was available because the investigation had just begun.[/FONT]