By Gabriella Borter
SURFSIDE, Fla., June 30 (Reuters) - Six more bodies have been found in the ruins of a Miami-area condominium tower, officials said on Wednesday, bringing the confirmed death toll to 18 nearly a week after the building collapsed.
Nobody has been pulled alive from the mounds of pulverized concrete, splintered lumber and twisted metal since the early hours of the disaster on June 24 in the oceanfront town of Surfside, Florida, adjacent to Miami Beach.
Authorities put the number of people missing and feared trapped in the ruins of the Champlain Towers South condo at 145. Two of the 18 confirmed fatalities were children, aged 10 and 4, Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava told a news conference.
Death toll rises to 18 nearly a week after Miami condo collapse Toggle share menu
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Death toll rises to 18 nearly a week after Miami condo collapse
Hundreds of rescuers are working on the site of the collapsed 12-story apartment building in Surfside, Florida, but no survivors have emerged since the immediate aftermath of the disaster AFP/CHANDAN KHANNA
01 Jul 2021 09:23AM Share this content
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SURFSIDE, California: Six more bodies have been found in the shattered ruins of a Miami-area condominium tower over the past 24 hours, officials said on Wednesday (Jun 30), bringing the confirmed death toll to 18 nearly a week after the building collapsed.
Champlain Towers South exposed and deteriorated rebar (Getty)
Raysa Rodriguez recounts a harrowing escape from her unit at the collapsed Surfside condominium, and lays out mounting warning signs in a newly filed lawsuit.
Among them: a concrete chunk that had fallen from the garage ceiling and a “wide crack” above her parking space. In her suit, which seeks class action status, Rodriguez also cites flooding in the underground garage dating back at least a decade that was reported by a former maintenance manager.
Two days before the collapse, a contractor who was jarred by the garage flooding, cracks and corrosion, alerted a building staff member. The staff member responded that water was pumped from the basement so often that pump motors were replaced every two years, according to the complaint.
Death toll climbs to 18 nearly a week after Florida beachfront condo collapse
The official death toll climbed to 18 on Thursday, nearly a week after a high-rise building collapsed in Surfside in Florida on June 26.
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UPDATED: July 1, 2021 05:54 IST
Emergency workers conduct search and rescue efforts as a large piece of concrete is lifted by heavy equipment at the site. (Photo: Reuters)
Six more bodies have been found in the shattered ruins of a collapsed Miami-area condominium tower in the past 24 hours, the mayor of Miami-Dade County said on Wednesday, bringing the confirmed death toll to 18 nearly a week after the building fell.
Federal investigation of Surfside begins. Mayor says Miami-Dade won t wait on reforms Douglas Hanks and Alex Daugherty, The Miami Herald
Jul. 1 The federal agency that pushed safety reforms after investigating the collapse of the World Trade Center s Twin Towers in 2001 announced a similar probe Wednesday of the Surfside catastrophe an inquiry that will likely last years.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology has been in Surfside since Sunday, and confirmed its plan to launch a full investigation with an aim of discovering what caused the Champlain Towers South building s collapse and what changes in laws, building codes and regulations could be made to prevent another failure of that kind.