Surveillance video shows moment FIU pedestrian bridge collapsed | Miami Herald

Update: New video posted to social media Friday shows the clearest view yet of collapse.

A startling video showing the moment the 950-ton pedestrian bridge at Florida International University collapsed onto cars traveling on Tamiami Trail was posted online late Thursday.

The only known footage of the accident, authorities on Friday said the video was shot on a cellphone inside Florida’s Sunguide traffic center, a state-run office in Miami where workers monitor traffic flow. The cellphone was pointed at a monitor displaying the county’s feed from an intersection camera.

Karla Damian, spokeswoman for Miami-Dade's Transportation and Public Works Department, said the video did come from the county's traffic-monitoring camera at Southwest Eighth Street and 109th Avenue, but Damian said the device isn't set up to preserve footage.

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"We have no recording of the bridge collapse," Damian said in an email Friday. She said Miami-Dade and Florida's Sunguide traffic center in Miami share video feeds with each other. "The video posted on social media appears to have been an individual recording of the system playback from the Sunguide Center’s monitors."

Late Thursday, the video made the rounds on Twitter and other social media sites.

The footage shows traffic flowing normally until the bridge suddenly, without warning, falls on the roadway on top of vehicles who were either stopped at the light or in motion. People can be seen standing on the bridge when it collapses.

Twitter users reacted with shock at the footage.