‘I saved my life.’ Surfside collapse survivor visits memorial wall, mourns her neighbors

Julieta Apfelbaum broke down before the photo of her neighbor’s smiling daughter.

At the growing memorial of the Champlain Towers South collapse in Surfside, Apfelbaum on Monday night mourned the loss of Graciela Cattarossi and the three generations of her family who are still missing. Apfelbaum also lived in the building — but made it out alive.

“I saved my life,” she said in Spanish. “I lost everything. My house, my belongings. I had my house full of things. I lost everything. I have nothing now.”

In the early morning of June 24, Apfelbaum said she awoke to what she felt was an earthquake. Lights wouldn’t turn on and neither would water. The hallway was dark.

She added that she ran to the balcony and a neighbor told her that the building next to them collapsed. The neighbor told her the elevator wasn’t working and the stairs were broken.

Apfelbaum changed into a shirt and grabbed her purse. She waved at first responders, who rescued her off her balcony.

Apfelbaum, who came to the memorial with her daughter Marilina, had a personal connection to the tragedy that has stilled an international, tight-knit community.

Remembering the victims

Many who came to pay their respects were strangers to those lost and missing.

Some held up traffic on Harding Avenue to take a photo. Others came on foot and took cellphone videos alongside news crews. They shared a common hope — that those missing would somehow be found alive.

Kateryna Gonta and her husband placed a yellow rose in the chain-link fence roughly every few feet. They live in a newer high-rise in Sunny Isles Beach but said they came to pray for those affected.

A man named Giacomo from Miami Beach brought one yellow lily and placed it near a banner that read: “Praying for all of you.”

“These are our neighbors. It’s just heartbreaking,” he said. “There’s no word to describe this loss. We’re just speechless. We are broken down because of course it may happen to anyone but this should never happen.”

Giovanni West cleared the sidewalk below the memorial, cleaning up flowers and glass from prayer candles that broke during the demolition of the rest of the south tower late Sunday night.

“We’re waiting for them. We have food. We have water. We have everything for them,” West said. “If this happened to me, I would want people to look for me.”

He also demanded answers from those involved in the development of the building.

“We need answers. We need something,” West said. “The people who live here now are very worried.”

Albert Michael Armando Puentes III said he made the memorial wall his first stop in Miami. Visiting from St. Petersburg, Florida, he said the scene grounded him.

It reminded him of another earth-shattering event: The September 11 attacks. He was 14 and living in New York City at the time.

“It brings back some seriously crazy memories from that day,” Puentes said. “Things like this make you realize life is too short. You don’t take nothing for granted.”

Miami Herald staff writer Carli Teproff and photographer Alexia Foderé contributed to this report.

This story was originally published July 5, 2021 at 11:09 PM.