Tag Archives: Surfside

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)

Funeral for family of 4 to be first for victims of Miami condo collapse

By Francisco Alvarado

SURFSIDE, Fla. (Reuters) -The first funeral for victims of a collapsed Miami-area condo building will be held on Tuesday as mourners gather to lay to rest a family of four, including two young children, nearly two weeks after the disaster struck.

Also, officials updated the death toll to 32 after four more bodies were found in the partially collapsed 12-story Champlain Towers South building in Surfside, Florida. Some 113 people were still missing as rescue workers battled high winds from approaching Tropical Storm Elsa. Officials said they still have not determined what caused the collapse.

The lives of Marcus Guara, 52, his wife Ana Guara, 42, and their daughters, Lucia, 10, and Emma, 4, will be memorialized in a service at the St. Joseph Catholic Church in Miami Beach starting 2:30 p.m. ET.

Marcus Guara had just started a new job in November as a sales manager for a maker of towels and linens and often raised funds for charities, including St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, according to his Facebook account.

Nobody has been pulled alive from the mounds of pulverized concrete, splintered lumber and twisted metal since the early hours of June 24 when roughly half of the building came tumbling down in an oceanfront town adjacent to Miami Beach.

Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett told a briefing that rescue workers have been bothered by strong winds as Elsa approaches from the south.

“The wind is hampering the large cranes moving very heavy debris,” Burkett said, adding that he met with a family hoping rescuers will find their daughter, a recent law school graduate who married in January, and their son-in-law.

Experts and officials have warned that the probability of finding survivors was remote given how much time has passed.

Miami-Dade County Fire Chief Alan Cominsky said rescuers have not found any “livable spaces”. He said workers had removed more than 124 tons, or 5 million pounds worth, of debris to date.

Forecasters predict the area will be spared the worst of the storm. Still, concerns over the impact of Elsa prompted officials to order the demolition of the half of building that had been left standing, which was carried out on Sunday night.

Investigators have not determined what caused the 40-year-old complex to collapse. A 2018 engineering report found structural deficiencies that are now the focus of inquiries that include a grand jury examination.

Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava cautioned that it could take some time to find the root cause.

“The whole world wants to know what happened here,” Cava told the briefing. “I look forward to learning the truth.”

(Reporting by Franciso Alvarado; Additional reporting by Barbara Goldberg in Maplewood, New Jersey and Nathan Layne in Wilton, Connecticut; Editing by Andrea Ricci and David Gregorio)

Biden in Florida to comfort families as search at collapse site paused over safety concerns

By Katanga Johnson and Steve Holland

SURFSIDE, Fla. (Reuters) – President Joe Biden visited Florida on Thursday to comfort the families of those killed and missing in last week’s condominium collapse, as the search-and-rescue operation was temporarily suspended due to concerns about the stability of the remaining structure.

Biden, whose personal experience with tragedy has marked his political career, was set to reprise the role of “consoler-in-chief” a week after the 12-story building partially caved in as residents slept.

The confirmed death toll remained at 18, after the discovery of six more bodies in the ruins of the Champlain Towers South condo, including two children, aged 4 and 10. Another 145 people are missing and feared trapped in the rubble, with hopes of finding any survivors dimming with each passing day.

After arriving in Miami, Biden attended a briefing with local officials, including Governor Ron DeSantis, who is widely seen as a potential Republican presidential candidate in 2024.

Biden told them he would deliver “whatever you need” and said he expected the federal government would cover the full costs for the county and state.

“We’re not going anywhere,” he said. “This is life or death.”

Workers at the site were instructed to stop just after 2 a.m. on Thursday, when movement in the debris raised concerns that the part of the building still standing could collapse, officials said.

“The search-and-rescue operation will continue as soon as it is safe to do so,” Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said at a news briefing. Officials said they were unsure when that would happen.

Authorities said they have not given up on locating survivors. But nobody has been pulled alive from the wreckage since the early hours of the disaster in the oceanfront town of Surfside, adjacent to Miami Beach.

Miami-Dade County Fire Chief Alan Cominsky said rescuers did hear signs of life during their initial efforts last week.

“They were searching for a female voice, is what we heard for several hours,” he said. “Eventually, we didn’t hear her voice anymore.”

Officials are also keeping a watchful eye on Tropical Storm Elsa, which formed over the Atlantic and could reach south Florida by Monday, potentially hampering search operations.

SEARCH-AND-RESCUE

Among those traveling with Biden on Thursday were U.S. Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz, whose district includes the collapse site; Federal Emergency Management Agency Administrator Deanne Criswell; and Liz Sherwood-Randall, White House homeland security adviser.

Biden had delayed his visit to Florida to avoid interrupting rescue efforts.

FEMA has dispatched five urban search-and-rescue teams – each comprised of 80 members – to assist in sifting through the rubble, White House spokesperson Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters aboard Air Force One.

DeSantis said workers have removed some 1,400 tons of material from the collapse site.

Thursday’s trip is Biden’s second visit to the scene of a disaster since he became president in January.

In February, he traveled to Texas after a winter storm left millions without power or clean water for days and killed several people.

After his briefing, the president planned to thank first responders and rescue crews before meeting with victims’ families. He is scheduled to deliver remarks shortly before 4 p.m. in Miami.

Biden’s ability to connect his own hardships with the grief and anguish of others has become a defining feature of his public life, having endured the deaths of his first wife, a daughter and a son.

Investigators have not determined what caused nearly half of the 40-year-old condo complex to crumble in one of the deadliest building collapses in U.S. history.

But a 2018 report prepared by engineering firm Morabito Consultants ahead of a building safety recertification process found structural deficiencies in the 136-unit complex that are now the focus of inquiries.

The Washington Post reported late on Wednesday that the majority of the board of the Surfside condominium, including its president, resigned in 2019, partly in frustration over what was seen as the sluggish response to the report.

(Reporting By Katanga Johnson in Surfside and Steve Holland in Bal Harbor; Additional reporting by Jarrett Renshaw, Francisco Alvarado, Brendan O’Brien, Peter Szekely, Kanishka Singh and Trevor Hunnicutt; Writing by Joseph Ax; Editing by Giles Elgood, Steve Orlofsky and Sonya Hepinstall)

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)

Sales manager, young artist, devoted couple, among victims of Florida collapse

(Reuters) – With search-and-rescue teams still sifting through the rubble of a collapsed Florida condominium building, authorities by late Monday had confirmed 11 victims of the deadly disaster and their identities, while some 150 people remain missing.

Those recovered from rubble in the oceanside town of Surfside included a young Puerto Rican graphic artist who refused to let a disability dampen his spirits, a devoted couple who had been married for nearly 60 years and a volunteer Little League baseball coach.

Here are brief profiles of nine of them:

MARCUS GUARA

Marcus Guara, 52, had just started a new job in November as regional sales manager at Kassatex New York, a maker of towels, linens and other textiles, according to his social media posts. He had held a series of sales jobs since graduating from the University of Miami in 1990, he reported on Linked In. His Facebook account was dominated by family photos and fundraiser posts for charities, mostly the ALS Association and St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital.

Also missing were his wife, Ana Guara, 41, and their daughters, Lucia, 11, and Emma, 4. Last November, he wrote on Facebook that his “pride was overwhelming” when Lucia asked him to mail a letter to St. Jude Hospital stuffed with her piggy bank savings because “they need it more than I do.”

LUIS ANDRES BERMUDEZ AND ANA ORTIZ

Luis Andres Bermudez, a young graphic artist from Puerto Rico, was inspiring example of courage who never let a disability keep him from his dreams or dampen his sunny disposition, his former teacher said. Andres Bermudez, 26, lived with his mother Ana Ortiz, 46, who also was identified as one of the casualties of the collapse.

“Luis Andres is an example of courage and bravery FOR ALL of us,” said Jose J. Ortiz Carlo, a teacher who had Andres Bermudez in a photography class at Robinson School in Puerto Rico, where he graduated in 2014.

Despite being confined to a wheelchair because of muscular dystrophy, Andres Bermudez, known as Luiyo, never missed school and was always smiling, the teacher said on Facebook.

In 2018, he launched Saucy Boyz Clothing, a fashion line of T-shirts and caps with his artwork on them that he called “a dream come true for me” on social media.

The young man’s father, Luis Didi Bermudez, who was separated from his mother and was not in the building when it collapsed, mourned his son, saying in a Facebook post translated from Spanish, “You are and will be the best in my life.”

Alex Garcia, a close friend of Ortiz, told The Miami Herald that she had just recently married his friend, Frankie Kleiman, who was also missing in the wreckage. Ortiz was “a rock star” who was committed to giving her son the best possible life, Garcia said.

LEON OLIWKOWICZ AND CHRISTINA BEATRIZ ELVIRA

A couple identified by police as Leon Oliwkowicz, 80, and his wife, Christina Beatriz Elvira, 74, were both originally from Venezuela and were active in the Ultra Orthodox Chabad Lubavitch community, according to the COLlive.com, a news outlet that covers Chabad Lubavitch communities. In 2019, the couple, donated a Torah scroll to Yeshivas Ohr Eliyahu – Lubavitch Mesivta of Chicago, a school where their daughter works as a secretary. Venezuelan journalist Shirley Varnagy, a friend of their daughter, said on Instagram that the couple were among six Venezuelans who lived in the building.

ANTONIO LOZANO AND GLADYS LOZANO

Antonio Lozano, 83, and Gladys Lozano, 79, would joke about who would die first because they didn’t want to live without each other, their son Sergio told Miami ABC affiliate WPLG. The couple would have celebrated their 59th anniversary on July 21, said Sergio, who had dinner with them hours before the deadly collapse in the early hours of Thursday. “Both were avid donators to non-profit organizations, especially to cancer since my grandmother lost her mother to the sickness,” the couple’s grandson, Brian, told ABC News in a statement. “Always providing for anyone who’s in need or just to spark a smile on someone’s face. Their souls were truly beautiful and are now blessed.”

MANUEL LAFONT

Manuel LaFont, 54, was with his 10-year-old son on the baseball field almost every day. Those who knew the Little League coach, known as Manny, said he was devoted to helping kids become better players, according to People magazine. The father of two and business consultant was asleep when the building collapsed, his ex-wife, Adriana, told the USA TODAY Network. She confirmed his death on Facebook, writing, “So many memories inside the walls that are no more today, forever engraved experiences in the heart! My manny, who was my partner for so many years, father of my children, who scolds me and loves me at the same time.”

STACIE FANG

Stacie Fang, 54, was the mother of one of the few people known to have survived the collapse. Her son, Jonah Handler, 15, was pulled from the wreckage hours after the building fell.

Fang was vice president at a firm that puts on an annual event for customer relationship management, retail and marketing executives, according to her LinkedIn account. A former resident of New York City’s Staten Island, she was a graduate of New York’s Pace University. “There are no words to describe the tragic loss of our beloved Stacie,” her family said in a statement.

(Reporting by Peter Szekely in New York and Linda So in Washington; Editing by Alistair Bell, Chizu Nomiyama and Steve Orlofsky)

Rescuers still hope for survivors as death toll in Florida collapse hits 10

By Gabriella Borter

SURFSIDE, Fla. (Reuters) -Rescue workers pulled a 10th body from the rubble of a collapsed Florida condominium on Monday, as officials vowed to keep searching for any possible survivors five days after the 12-story building fell without warning as residents slept.

Crews were using cranes, dogs and infrared scans as they looked for signs of life amid the ruins, hoping air pockets may have formed underneath the concrete that could be keeping some people alive.

“We’re going to continue and work ceaselessly to exhaust every possible options in our search,” Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava told a news briefing.

The death toll appears certain to rise, and Levine Cava acknowledged the number of casualties is “fluid.” There are 151 people still unaccounted for.

The cause of the collapse at the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, near Miami, remains under investigation.

A 2018 engineer’s report found serious concrete deterioration in the underground parking garage as well as major damage in the concrete slab beneath the pool deck. The author, Frank Morabito, wrote the deterioration would “expand exponentially” if it was not repaired in the near future.

But Ross Prieto, then Surfside’s top building official, met residents the following month after reviewing the report and assured them the building was “in very good shape,” according to minutes of the meeting released by the town on Monday.

Reuters was unable to reach Prieto, who is no longer employed by Surfside. He told the Miami Herald newspaper he did not remember getting the report.

The engineer’s report was commissioned in advance of the condo seeking recertification, a required process for buildings that reach 40 years of age. The tower was constructed in 1981. An estimate prepared by Morabito Consultants in 2018 put the cost of repairs at $9.1 million, including electrical, plumbing and work on the façade.

After the meeting, Prieto emailed the town’s manager to say it “went very well. The response was very positive from everyone in the room. All main concerns over their forty year recertification process were addressed.”

Guillermo Olmedillo, Surfside’s town manager in 2018, told Reuters he did not recall hearing about any issues related to the tower based on the engineer’s report.

“The last thing I knew was that everything is OK, reported by the building official,” he said.

Gregg Schlesinger, a lawyer and former general contractor who specializes in construction-failure cases, said it was clear the deficiencies identified in the 2018 report were the main cause of the disaster.

But Donna DiMaggio Berger, a lawyer who works with the condo association, said the issues were typical for older buildings in the area and did not alarm board members, all of whom lived in the tower with their families.

Morabito Consultants was retained by the building in 2020 to prepare a 40-year building repair plan.

The firm said on Saturday that roof repairs were underway at the time of the collapse but concrete restoration had not yet started.

“We are deeply troubled by this building collapse and are working closely with the investigating authorities to understand why the structure failed,” it said.

Levine Cava vowed officials will “get to the bottom” of why the building collapsed but said the priority right now is searching for survivors.

‘TIME IS OF THE ESSENCE’

Miami-Dade Assistant Fire Chief Raide Jadallah said workers have found voids large enough to keep victims alive.

“Not to say that we have see anyone down there, but we’ve not gotten to the very bottom,” he said.

He said searchers have heard some sounds, such as tapping of scratching, though he acknowledged it could be metal shifting. But he emphasized that there is no set amount of time after which the rescue effort should cease.

The teams include experts sent by Israel and Mexico to assist in the search.

Some relatives of those missing have provided DNA samples to officials, and family members were permitted to pay a private visit to the site by special arrangement on Sunday, Levine Cava said.

The police have identified eight victims, including a couple married for nearly 60 years and a mother whose teenage son is one of the few known survivors.

At a makeshift memorial a block away, tributes to the victims and “missing” posters hung on a chain-link fence, with flowers and children’s toys strewn about.

Given the scores of those still missing, the disaster may end up one of the deadliest non-deliberate structural failures in U.S. history.

Ninety-eight people perished when the roof of the Knickerbocker Theatre in Washington, D.C., gave way from the weight of snow during a silent movie screening in January 1922. Two interior walkways collapsed into the lobby of the Hyatt Regency hotel in Kansas City, Missouri, during a dance party in July 1981, killing 114.

(Additional reporting by Brendan O’Brien, Brad Heath, Peter Szekely and Kanishka Singh; Writing by Joseph Ax; Editing by Angus MacSwan and Alistair Bell)