Searchers find another Florida condo collapse victim, raising toll to 95

(Reuters) – Searchers at a partially collapsed condominium near Miami found another victim, raising the number of confirmed deaths to 95 on Tuesday as heavy rain and the gruesome challenge of identifying human remains slowed the recovery effort, officials said.

With 892 truckloads of concrete and debris totaling 18 million pounds (8.16 million kg) carted from the Surfside, Florida, site in past 20 days, the search focused on 14 people who were still missing, Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said.

While the number of missing, which includes 10 confirmed victims who have yet to be identified, has declined sharply and is less than half of what it was just two days ago, officials said finishing the search would be more time consuming.

“It’s a scientific, methodical process to identify human remains,” Levine Cava told a briefing. “As we’ve said, this work is becoming more difficult with the passage of time, and although our teams are working as hard as they can, it takes time.”

So far, the local medical examiner has identified the remains of 85 of the 95 known victims, and their families have been notified, she added.

The list of those unaccounted for was compiled from all reports received from family members, even if they were uncertain that their missing loved ones were in the building at the time of the collapse, officials said.

The only people known to have survived were pulled from the wreckage within hours after part of the 12-story oceanfront Champlain Towers South condominium complex collapsed without warning in the early morning hours of June 24.

Officials have not yet determined the cause.

Also slowing the process were heavy rains on Monday that flooded the site and its underground garage, and forced searchers to pause while the water was pumped out, officials said.

(Reporting by Peter Szekely in New York; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)

Identifying remains arduous as Florida condo collapse death toll rises to 94

(Reuters) -Confirmed deaths in the partial collapse of a condominium near Miami rose by four to 94 on Monday as identifying remains became progressively difficult with the recovery effort in its 19th day, Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said.

Due to the passage of time, recovery workers are leaning more heavily on the medical examiner’s office to identify recovered bodies, an undertaking that is “very methodical” and takes time, Levine Cava said at a briefing.

The number of people still unaccounted for dropped to 22 on Monday from 31 a day earlier, and may include some of the victims who have yet to be identified in the rubble of the 12-story oceanfront building in the town of Surfside that partially collapsed in the early morning hours of June 24.

“The process of making identifications has become more difficult as time goes on, and the recovery at this point is yielding human remains,” Levine Cava said.

With no survivors rescued from the ruins since the first few hours after the collapse, officials last week declared that their search effort had switched from rescue to recovery.

Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett said security is being tightened at the site due to the importance of the location to families who lost loved ones.

A debate has already begun in the community over what to do with the site, with some people eager for it to be turned into a memorial for the victims.

“It’s much more than a collapsed building. It is a holy site,” Burkett said.

(Reporting by Nathan Layne in Wilton, Connecticut and Barbara Goldberg in Maplewood, New Jersey; editing by Jonathan Oatis and Steve Orlofsky)

Death toll in Florida condo collapse rises to 78

(Reuters) -The confirmed death toll in the collapse of a Miami-area condominium tower increased to 78 on Friday after workers pulled the remains of an additional 14 people from the rubble of the building, an official said.

A total of 62 people remain missing and feared dead in the concrete and steel ruins of the 12-story tower, Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava told a news conference.

The number of missing could change as it remains possible that not all were in the building when it abruptly caved in and crumbled to the ground early on June 24.

“This is a staggering and heart-breaking number that affects all of us very deeply,” Levine Cava told a briefing.

The rising death toll followed the removal of 13 million pounds (589,6701 kg) of debris from the site, she said.

Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett said that crews have whittled down the size of the building debris pile from four or five stories to nearly ground level, with some areas at below-ground level.

“So the progress that our search and rescue teams are making is really incredible,” Burkett said.

Investigators have not determined what caused the Champlain Towers South to fall apart without warning. Attention has been focused on a 2018 engineering report that warned of structural deficiencies.

(reporting by Peter Szekely in New York and Nathan Layne in Wilton, Connecticut, Editing by Franklin Paul and Aurora Ellis)

Death toll in Florida condo collapse rises by 6 to 60

By Brad Brooks

SURFSIDE, Fla. (Reuters) -Crews searching the collapsed condominium tower near Miami recovered an additional six bodies, bringing the death toll to 60, officials said on Thursday, one day after declaring there was no longer hope of finding anyone alive.

Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava told a news conference that 80 people were still considered missing in the disaster, believed to have been inside the Champlain Towers South when it abruptly crumbled in the early hours of June 24.

As of midnight Eastern Daylight Time (0400 GMT) on Thursday, the emergency effort officially transitioned from an attempt to find survivors to a recovery operation, vanquishing any hope of extracting anyone alive from the rubble.

“Yesterday was tough,” Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said at the news conference. “But the work is going to go on and they are going to identify every single person.”

(Reporting Brad Brooks in Surfside, Florida and Nathan Layne in Wilton, Connecticut; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Howard Goller)

Death toll in Miami condo collapse rises to 46

By Brad Brooks

SURFSIDE, Fla. (Reuters) -Search and rescue workers on Wednesday recovered 10 more bodies from the rubble of an apartment block outside Miami that collapsed last month, bringing the death toll to 46, as hopes faded that any of the 94 people still unaccounted for would be found alive.

The effort to locate survivors of the Champlain Towers South building continued in warm, dry conditions with the threat from Tropical Storm Elsa, battering the opposite side of Florida, having receded.

Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava told a briefing that in addition to the 46 confirmed dead, 94 others who may have been inside the building in Surfside when it partially collapsed on June 24 were still unaccounted for.

Levine Cava, who shed tears as she repeated her remarks in Spanish, said the rescue effort had been made easier by the planned demolition on Sunday night of the half of building that had remained standing.

“The team continues to make progress in the areas of the pile that was inaccessible prior to the demolition,” Levine Cava said.

As she spoke, a new shift of workers walked by in small groups, wearing clean uniforms and not sharing a word with each other, while a group leaving the rubble pile looked exhausted and were drenched in sweat.

Though local officials say they have not given up hope of finding survivors, no one has been discovered alive in the rubble since the first few hours after the building came down.

Asked about whether continuing the search was giving families false hope, Levine Cava said: “They are being supported to come to closure as soon as possible.”

(reporting by Brad Brooks and Franciso Alvarado; additional reporting by Jonathan Allen in New York and Nathan Layne in Wilton, Connecticut; editing by Jonathan Oatis and John Stonestreet)

Death toll rises to 16 nearly a week after Florida condo collapse

By Gabriella Borter

SURFSIDE, Fla. (Reuters) -Another four bodies were found overnight in the shattered ruins of a collapsed Miami-area condominium tower, the mayor of Miami-Dade County said on Wednesday, bringing the confirmed death toll to 16 nearly a week after the building fell.

Nobody has been pulled alive from the mounds of pulverized concrete, splintered lumber and twisted metal since the early hours of the disaster, with 147 people still unaccounted for.

Officials have said they still harbor hope of finding survivors.

Investigators have not concluded what caused nearly half of the 40-year-old Champlain Towers South condo to crumple as residents slept in the early hours of last Thursday.

But a 2018 engineer’s report on the 12-floor, 136-unit complex, prepared ahead of a building safety recertification process, found structural deficiencies that are now the focus of inquiries.

As recently as April, the condo association’s president warned residents in a letter that severe concrete damage identified by the engineer around the base of the building had since grown “significantly worse.”

(Reporting by Gabriella Borter in Surfside, Fla; Additional reporting by Brad Heath, Alexandra Ulmer, Peter Szekely, Dan Whitcomb, Rich McKay, Brendan O’Brien and Kanishka Singh. Writing and additional reporting by Steve Gorman; Editing by Steve Orlofsky and Alistair Bell)

Praying for ‘miracle,’ families await news of missing in Florida condo collapse

By Francisco Alvarado

SURFSIDE, Fla. (Reuters) -Families and friends of the 159 people missing after the collapse of a condo building in a Miami suburb were clinging to hope on Friday as rescue workers sifted through a mountain of debris for signs of life, having found four dead so far.

Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava told reporters on Friday crews had pulled three more bodies from the wreckage overnight, after one person was reported to have died on Thursday. Officials increased the number of presumed missing from 99 reported missing on Thursday.

“I’m praying for a miracle,” Rachel Spiegel, whose mother Judy Spiegel is missing, told CNN on Friday.

The last time Spiegel communicated with her mom was Wednesday night, when her mother excitedly texted her that she had bought a dress online for Spiegel’s daughter, her granddaughter.

Hours later, early Thursday morning, a large section of the Champlain Towers South condominium in Surfside, a barrier island town across Biscayne Bay from the city of Miami, crumbled to the ground, authorities said.

Video captured by a security camera nearby showed an entire side of the building suddenly folding in two sections, one after the other, at about 1:30 a.m. (0530 GMT) on Thursday, throwing up clouds of dust.

Dozens of people were gathered at a reunification site at the Surfside Community Center on Friday, where the scene was hectic with volunteers running around and people hugging to console each other.

Outside the center, Toby Fried held back tears when she said she last spoke to her brother Chiam “Harry” Rosenberg around midnight Wednesday. Rosenberg had lived in Champlain Towers for about a year and a half. He and his daughter Malki Weiss and Beni Weiss, who were visiting him from Brooklyn, are all missing.

“They came to stay with him for a week on vacation,” Fried said.

Joining the families searching for missing loved ones was Paraguay’s first lady Silvana López Moreira, who traveled to Florida because her sister, brother-in-law and their children were unaccounted for. The first lady’s family owned a condo in the building, local media reported.

Miami-Dade Fire Rescue Assistant Fire Chief Ray Jadallah said on Friday that rescuers had heard sounds in the rubble overnight, but said it could be either falling debris or people tapping.

“We are listening for sounds, human sounds and tapping,” Jadallah said, as rescuers use shovels and jackhammers to tunnel under the debris to find pockets where survivors could be.

Mariela Porras, a friend of a woman who lived in the building with her young daughter and is now missing, said she has not abandoned hope that the two were still alive beneath the rubble.

“I vacillate between hope and I’m heartbroken,” Porras told CNN.

‘WE STILL HAVE HOPE’ Mayor Cava on Friday said that rescue teams were “incredibly motivated” to find anyone who might have survived the collapse.

“We still have hope that we will find people alive,” the mayor said.

She said on Thursday that 110 individuals whose whereabouts were initially unknown have since been located and “declared safe.”

A fire official said earlier that 35 people were evacuated from the section of the high-rise left standing, and response teams using trained dogs and drones in the search pulled two individuals from the rubble. One of them was dead.

U.S. President Joe Biden approved an emergency declaration in the state of Florida and ordered federal assistance to supplement state and local response efforts.

“The president’s action authorizes the Department of Homeland Security, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), to coordinate all disaster relief efforts,” the White House said on Friday.

What caused the 40-year-old high-rise to cave in was not immediately known, although local officials said the 12-story tower was undergoing roof construction and other repairs.

Space-based radar data showed that the land underneath the building was sinking during the 1990s, according to a 2020 study. That by itself would not cause a building’s collapse but it is worth investigating further, according to Florida International University professor Shimon Wdowinksi, one of the study’s authors.

The sinking, or subsidence, underneath the building amounted to 1 to 3 millimeters per year, which could add up to several inches over a decade, according to the study.

Late Thursday night, a resident of the collapsed building filed what is believed to be the first lawsuit against the condominium, the Champlain Towers South Condominium Association.

Manuel Drezner said in the proposed class action that the collapse could have been avoided had the condominium made needed repairs and ensured it was safe.

He said the condominium should pay unit owners millions of dollars for their “unfathomable loss.”

Officials said the complex, built in 1981, was going through a recertification process requiring repairs, with another building under construction on an adjacent site.

The Champlain Towers South had more than 130 units, about 80 of which were occupied. It had been subject to various inspections recently due to the recertification process and the adjacent building construction, Surfside Commissioner Charles Kesl told Miami television station WPLG Local 10.

(Reporting by Francisco Alvarado in Surfside, Florida; Additional reporting by Kanishka Singh in Bengaluru, Rich McKay in Atlanta, Gabriella Borter in Washington and Peter Szekely in New York; Editing by Mike Collett-White and Jonathan Oatis)