'Frantic search to seek hope': Surfside rescuers tunnel through wreckage to find survivors; death toll rises to 10

SURFSIDE, Fla. – Four days after the deadly Surfside condo building collapse near Miami, rescue workers on Monday dug through debris as South Florida and clung to hope of finding some survivors out of the 151 people still missing.

“The search and rescue operation continues,” Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava told reporters late Monday morning, announcing the recovery of a 10th victim. “These numbers are very fluid and this will continue to change.”

Fears are rising that the disaster will wind up ranking among the worst in the state’s history, with a death toll that could be more than triple that of Hurricane Andrew in 1992. But no officials were ready to concede that yet.

“The search continues and will not stop,” Gov. Ron DeSantis said of an around-the-clock effort that has included a specialized crew from Israel working in treacherous conditions.

The governor promised relocation help for residents who lost their homes, and counseling services for survivors and families who lost loved ones.

Investigations, both by engineers and criminal prosecutors, are ongoing to find a cause of the catastrophe.

“We need to identify why this happened,” DeSantis said, cautioning against quick answers. “This is going to take a long time.”

Added Levine Cava, “We are going to get to the bottom of what happened here.”

Rescuers have been able to find some voids inside the wreckage, mostly in the basement and parking garage areas, said Andy Alvarez, a deputy incident commander with Miami-Dade Fire Rescue, in an interview on ABC’s “Good Morning America.”

“We have over 80 rescuers at a time that are breaching the walls that collapsed, in a frantic effort to try to rescue those that are still viable and to get to those voids that we typically know exist in these buildings,” Alvarez said in a report posted on Local10.com.

“We have been able to tunnel through the building,” Alvarez added. “This is a frantic search to seek that hope, that miracle, to see who we can bring out of this building alive.”

At the same time, efforts are intensifying to find the cause of the disaster and how much was known about structural problems at the 40-year-old Champlain Towers South building, and whether it was preventable.

The New York Times on Monday quoted experts who have examined video footage and focused on a spot in the lowest part of the structure — possibly in or below the underground parking garage — where an initial failure could have set off a “structural avalanche.” This is known as a “progressive collapse,” with design flaws and other failures piling up over time.

“It does appear to start either at or very near the bottom of the structure,” said Donald O. Dusenberry, a consulting engineer who has investigated many structural collapses, told the newspaper. “It’s not like there’s a failure high and it pancaked down.”

The Miami Herald reported Monday that a month after an engineer’s report flagged “major structural damage” at Champlain Towers South, the chief building official for the town of Surfside told residents the condominium was “in very good shape,” according to minutes from a November 2018 board meeting obtained by the newspaper.

Ross Prieto, who left the post last year, had reviewed the engineer’s report, the minutes say. Records show condo board member Mara Chouela forwarded Prieto two reports: the “structural field survey report” by engineer Frank Morabito of Morabito Consultants detailing the building’s structural deficiencies, and a mechanical and electrical engineering report by Thomas E. Henz. P.E. This was shown in an email posted on the town’s website.

But Saturday, Prieto told the Herald he didn’t remember getting the report, which detailed “abundant cracking” in concrete columns, beams and walls.

Toll continues to rise

The names of another four people confirmed killed in the Surfside condo building disaster were released Sunday night after their bodies were found in the ongoing search and recovery effort.

The remains of Luis Bermudez, 26, his mother Anna Ortiz, 46, Leon Oliwkowicz, 80, and Christina Beatriz Evira, 74, were discovered after rescue workers labored to dig a 125-foot trench through the rubble of the Champlain Towers South tower, Miami-Dade police said.

“God decided that he wanted one more angel in heaven. I still do not believe it. I LOVE you and will love you forever,” Luis Bermudez’s father, who is also named Luis Bermudez, wrote on Facebook.

Of the 10 confirmed fatalities so far, one died at the hospital and the others were found dead at the site.

Eight of the victims had been publicly identified as of Sunday night. The first four victims to be named were Stacie Dawn Fang, 54, Antonio Lozano, 83, Gladys Lozano, 79, and Manuel LaFont, 54.

Rescue workers were still searching for signs of life.

“Any void, any crevice that the team sees, that’s where they search through. Any that shows positive potential — any little bit of potential — the crews aggressively head in that area,” Miami-Dade Fire Chief Alan Cominsky said at a news conference Sunday.

But hopes were fading.

Family members of the victims boarded two buses Sunday afternoon for a visit to the site in what Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava described as “a very private event.”

At Mass at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in Miami Beach, Father Juan Sosa read the names of missing parishioners from a list provided by the Archdiocese:

– Gonzalo and María Torres, Apt. 912

– Magaly Delgado, Apt. 911

– Raymond and Mercedes Urgelles, Apt. 211

– Hilda Noriega and a companion, Apt. 602

– Julio and Angela Velasquez, Apt. 304

– Juan and Ana Mora and their son, Apt. 1011

– Graciela Cattarossi and family, Apt. 501

– Marcus and Anaely Guara and their two daughters, Apt. 802

Three parishioners were among the 35 rescued.

Former Surfside Mayor Paul Novack said family members were retaining hope that their loved ones may still be alive. Among the missing were his friends, he said.

“A couple of nice friends, an elderly couple,” Novack said. “Most people in the community do know someone in the building. It’s hard for everyone. Everyone is doing the very best they can.”

Canadian developer

Meanwhile, new revelations were emerging about the building’s developer, Nathan Reiber, a Canadian citizen who built the condo in 1981.

Reiber, who died in 2014, pleaded guilty in Canada in the 1970s to tax evasion for skimming thousands of dollars from coin-operated laundries and issuing $120,000 in checks for phony construction work to cover up the tax cheating, the Washington Post reported.

The late developer’s activities are significant because questions have arisen about the quality of the construction.

A 2018 engineering consultant’s report warned of “major structural damage” at the base of the building and also identified a “major error” in the placement of waterproofing on a flat rather than sloped surface, allowing the pooling of water.

The report to the condo association by Morabito Consultants said “failed waterproofing” below the pool deck and entrance drive at Champlain Towers South had led to significant deterioration of the concrete.

Replacing the waterproofing would be “extremely expensive,” the report stated, because it would require removal of the concrete slab above it.

“Failure to replace the waterproofing in the near future will cause the extent of the concrete deterioration to expand exponentially,” said the report, which was signed by Frank Morabito, the company’s president.

Morabito Consultants issued a statement Saturday offering prayers and saying the firm was “deeply troubled by this building collapse.”

After completing the 2018 report, the firm was hired in June 2020 to create plans for the repairs, which would be done by another company.

“At the time of the building collapse, roof repairs were underway, but concrete restoration had not yet begun,” the statement said.

The report was posted on the Town of Surfside’s website along with inspection reports and other documents about the collapsed building.

To what extent the damage identified in the report was addressed by the condo association, or whether it had anything to do with the building’s collapse, was unclear.

Experts say the disaster will require an extensive investigation and may involve multiple causes.

Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett said at a news conference Sunday that town staff were in the process of posting more building inspection documents to the town’s website for anyone to view.

Levine Cava said on Saturday that Miami-Dade County will conduct an “audit of all buildings at the 40-year point and beyond” over the next 30 days.

Relatives offer DNA samples

At the site on Sunday, rescuers in heavy protective gear used cranes, sonar, cameras and search dogs to look for signs of life.

Family members have submitted DNA samples to allow for the identification of human remains.

When a body is found, homicide detectives photograph, collect and send the remains to the Miami-Dade medical examiner’s office, police director Alfredo Ramirez said.

And although the focus remains on the rescue, at least two lawsuits have already been filed.

Plan to house residents

Burkett said he was working on a plan to temporarily relocate residents of Champlain Towers North, the collapsed tower’s “sister building,” which was constructed in the same year and remains standing next to the ruins.

The mayor said north tower residents have an “option to relocate.”

He said he didn’t plan to order residents to evacuate, but if he lived there, “I’d be gone.”

A cursory check of the north building shows it appears stable, Burkett said. He said a “deeper dive” into the north tower’s safety is proceeding and will take a few weeks to complete.

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(Staff writers Susannah Bryan, Austen Erblat, Alex DeLuca, Lois K. Solomon, David Fleshler, Brittany Wallman and Arlene Borenstein-Zuluaga contributed to this report.)

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