120 Accounted For, 159 Still Missing in the Rubble in Surfside

By Yehudit Garmaise

     While 120 people have been accounted for, the number of people who are still missing after Thursday’s collapse of the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, Fla., has increased to approximately 159: although no one is sure exactly how many residents were in the building at the time of the collapse.

     The official death toll is now four, Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine-Cava said this morning about the collapse of the 12-story, oceanfront condo building at 8777 Collins Ave., which is a block north of Miami Beach.

     The Miami-Dade Fire Department and Search and Rescue teams continue tunneling through tons of shattered concrete, steel, smoke, and dust to recover victims: an arduous and heartbreaking task that has been ongoing since Thursday morning at 1:15am, when the building inexplicably fell to pieces.

     “Unfortunately, this has been a tragic night,” said Mayor Levine-Cava.

     The cause of the destruction of approximately 70 of the Champlain Towers South’s 130 units is unknown, said Frank Rollason, the director of Miami-Dade Emergency Management.

     Search-and-rescue teams from Naples and Orlando have arrived to relieve Miami-Dade searchers who had been working their way through the rubble for more than 24 hours, said State Chief Financial Officer Jimmy Patronis, who also serves as the state fire marshal.

     The workers, who are cutting into the concrete with saws, boring holes through the rubble through which to use infrared cameras and sonar equipment, and using specially trained dogs, must work silently to determine the sources of the sounds that can lead them to trapped residents, Patronis said.

     U.S. Senator Marco Rubio said that search and rescue workers were able to make more headway at night, when the sun goes down, and the air cools off.

    “They are working so hard,” Sen. Rubio said. “They won’t stop.”