Death toll up to 5 as search for survivors goes on. Miami-Dade orders audit of high rises

Hope faltered with the sound of silence Saturday evening, as the dismal search for signs of life in Surfside entered its third day, a day that began with rain and a stubborn fire below ground -- and ended with the recovery of one body, along with the remains of other victims buried in the rubble.

Families and friends who had gathered at a nearby hotel anxiously prayed for the missing, as exhausted first responders dug through the wreckage of Chaplain Towers South, where a section of the 12-story oceanfront condominium toppled to the ground in a matter of seconds early Thursday morning.

Residents were abruptly awakened by a booming roar, as the building shuddered and cracked, and people helplessly grabbed their phones, a few of them managing to reach loved ones before their phones suddenly went dead.

For two days, rescue crews swept the mammoth pile of steel and concrete with search dogs, sonar and video cameras, using a grid system to locate possible survivors.

But there were no miracles Saturday.

The official death toll climbed to five, with 156 people still unaccounted for.

By late afternoon, voluntary evacuations were under way at two other buildings, Champlain Towers North and East — the North of the same age and similar design to the South Condo, the crumbled building, which had been flagged as having “major structural damage at least three years ago.

The grim task of identifying human remains began, as family members were asked to provide DNA samples. Four of the five victims were identified.

From South Florida to Washington, government officials pledged to send more support for victims and families while they sought answers to how and why such a monumental tragedy could occur with little or no warning to the residents who live there.

Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava, speaking at a press conference, emphasized that hope is not lost.

“Our top priority now continues to be search and rescue,” she said.

Saturday’s developments also included:

▪ Levine Cava ordered an immediate audit of all high rises older than 40 years and taller than five stories, as well as those built by the same developer that constructed the Champlain Towers condominium complex. It is not clear how many buildings will be audited, but Levine Cava said the review would be conducted “within the next 30 days, starting right now.”

▪ A team of scientists and engineers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology, a little-known sub-agency of the Department of Commerce that investigated the fall of the Twin Towers after 9/11, arrived Friday at the Surfside site. Their goal: to decide whether their agency should to launch a full investigation into the catastrophe, and then to begin the painstaking process of determining what went wrong.

▪ New details emerged that may begin to explain how such a deadly collapse could have occurred. In a 2018 report about the Champlain Towers South Condo, an engineer flagged a “major error” dating back to the building’s origin where lack of proper drainage on the pool deck had caused “major structural damage,” according to records released late Friday night by Surfside officials.

A lawsuit was filed in Miami-Dade circuit court by one resident, Manuel Drezner, alleging that the building’s homeowner’s association knew the building was unsafe but failed to inform residents.

In the absence of answers — about what caused the collapse, the whereabouts of family members, or why such a tragedy would happen — many turned to faith to pull them through the trauma.

At the reunification center six blocks to the north of the partially collapsed tower, families waited at the Grand Beach Hotel Surfside for any bit of news about their loved ones.

At about 8:15 a.m., 16 South Florida members of Legendarios, a Christian faith-based organization, arrived at the center with donuts and beverages for the waiting families and police officers. They formed a prayer circle on the curb outside the hotel and prayed together with officers before walking over to the site of the collapse.

“The community has come together in tremendous ways. We just wanted to add the prayer part to it,” said Mauricio Jaramillo, a member of the organization. “We’ve talked to a couple of people about what’s been going on, not knowing what’s happening. There’s a lot of questions. People want answers and we are here to pray.”

Audit for older high-rises

Levine Cava sought to reassure Miami-Dade residents of high-rise condominiums and apartment complexes that their buildings are safe and not likely to collapse.

“We want to make sure that every building has completed their recertification process,” she said, referring to the county’s requirement that all buildings be inspected for structural integrity at the 40-year mark. “We want to move swiftly to remediate any issues that may have been identified in that process.”

Levine Cava called on local cities to help with an “aggressive review” of all high rises, following a similar announcement earlier this week by the city of Miami’s building department for all buildings six stories or higher that are 40 years or older.

The majority of residential towers in Miami-Dade — 70.2% of the county’s total 1,016,653 single-family homes, condos and apartment buildings — were built before 1990, two years before Hurricane Andrew led to the hardening of South Florida’s building code.

A deep-seated fire

Much of Saturday morning was spent with search crews dealing with a stubborn subterranean blaze that was likely due to “fuel of the cars getting crushed and fluid leaking out,” according to Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett.

Between 80 and 120 first responders — members of Miami-Dade’s renowned Urban Search and Rescue Team bolstered by teams rushing in from around the state — worked overnight Friday and into Saturday morning.

The only known survivor pulled from the rubble was a boy on Thursday morning.

Option to evacuate

The condominium complex is made up of three residential towers. The partial collapse was in the 136-unit South tower. Its remaining units have been evacuated. FEMA and the Red Cross were assisting with relocating residents who live in the North and East towers, but Burkett noted late Saturday that a cursory inspection of those buildings didn’t turn up anything of immediate concern.

“There seems to be a consensus that we don’t want to make anybody do anything,” Burkett said. “What we want to do is give them options and make them feel safe. And keep them safe.”

‘Major error’ in structure

As the search-and-rescue effort transitions into a recovery, Surfside officials released records late Friday night that shed new light on the building’s structural integrity.

The concern was laid out in an October 2018 “Structural Field Survey Report,” produced for the condo association by engineer Frank Morabito of Morabito Consultants. Morabito wrote that the “main issue” at Champlain Towers was that the pool deck and outdoor planters “laid on a flat structure,” preventing water from draining. The lack of waterproofing was “a systemic issue” that traced back to a flaw “in the development of the original contract documents” 40 years ago, the report said.

It wasn’t immediately clear whether the issue was repaired or whether it could have ultimately contributed to the partial collapse.

The report documented how the years of standing water on the pool deck had severely damaged the concrete structural slabs below. The problem needed to be addressed quickly, Morabito wrote.

Search for answers

Returning to Surfside for the third day on Saturday, Gov. Ron DeSantis said he still had hope that more survivors would be found.

“You wake up in the morning hoping that more and more people were pulled out,” he said at the disaster command center.

And that news just hasn’t been what we had hoped.”

DeSantis said on Friday that he spoke with President Joe Biden, who “reiterated his administration’s full support” and offered “investigative personnel.” DeSantis also promised the state’s full cooperation with the probe.

“I think there’s a lot of other people throughout this community and really throughout Florida who want to know: How could a building just collapse like that?” the governor said.

The missing

Though county officials said 130 people are now accounted for, Levine Cava stressed that all the numbers are “fluid” because some residents may not have been in the building when it collapsed.

The list of unaccounted residents was compiled from missing person reports and data collected at the reunification site at the Surfside Community Center, which was emptied Friday afternoon as family members transitioned to a new center at the Grand Beach Hotel.

People with missing loved ones should call the family reunification hotline at 305-614-1819, visit the family reunification center, which moved Friday to the Grand Beach Hotel, 9449 Collins Ave., or open a missing person report online. Those who survived the collapse should fill out a wellness check form online.

Among those still missing are Cassie Stratton, who lived in the Champlain Towers South condo with her husband, Mike Stratton. A political strategist, he had left Monday on a business trip for Washington, D.C., where he got a frantic call from his wife early Thursday morning about their condo building shaking. Then the line went dead.

“It was 1:30 a.m. I’ll never, never forget that,” he said.

Latin American victims

About 30 people from Latin America and the Caribbean — including Colombia, Cuba, Chile, Paraguay, Uruguay, Venezuela, Puerto Rico and Argentina — are among those reported missing by friends and family following the collapse, highlighting the international reach of the tragedy.

Crews brought in heavy machinery Saturday to remove rubble from above. The rescuers boring through the concrete from the garage under the building are only entering the passageways after structural engineers determine what is safe and where pylons should be placed to bolster support.

This story was originally published June 26, 2021 at 9:30 AM with the headline "Death toll up to 5 as search for survivors goes on. Miami-Dade orders audit of high rises."