FL- 12 Story Condo Partial Building Collapse, many still unaccounted for, Miami, 24 June 2021

[Herat]

The remaining portion of the damaged Champlain Towers South building has to be considered unstable and will end up being taken down.

I was mentioning a second building, two blocks away that is called the Champlain Towers North.

On GoogleEarth it appears to be exactly the same size and layout as it's collapsed twin.

 

[indicolite22]

If that building was constructed 40 years ago, even minor water or sewer pipe leaks could have softened the hard fill it was built on.

SBM. Apparently leaks were reported according to a relative of a resident:

She said leaks were a chronic problem in the building, where her father has owned the unit for 30 years.

“The last time I was there, I looked at him and I said: ‘I am serious,’” she recalled. “‘This building is going to collapse.’”

According to the mayor, the roof of the building was undergoing repairs.

Miami Beach building partially collapses, rescue underway

 

[Barbieshell]

Saw this on the news in the UK today, looks absolutely horrific. My heart goes out to all those that have perished and I pray anyone missing is recovered alive.
Looking at it it's like the whole end of the building went, hopefully there will be answers as to what caused this tragedy forthcoming.

 

[indicolite22]

Another report from a resident:

He said that there had been constant construction around the building since he moved there in 2018. “Everyone was constantly being shaken,” he said.

‘Like it had been hit by a missile’: Residents who survived the collapse describe being inside.

 

[Dontknow?]

Fire Breaks Out At Partially Collapsed Surfside Building

 

[indicolite22]

Collapsed Miami condo had been sinking into Earth as early as the 1990s, researchers say | USA TODAY

A Florida high rise that collapsed Wednesday night was determined to be unstable a year ago, according to a researcher at Florida International University.

Wdowinski said his research is not meant to suggest any certainty about what caused the collapse of the condominium. The building was sinking at a rate of about 2 millimeters a year in the 1990s, and the sinking could have slowed or accelerated in the time since.

“It was a byproduct of analyzing the data. We saw this building had some kind of unusual movement,” Wdownski said.

ETA: Original research article
https://faculty.fiu.edu/~swdowins/publications/Fiaschi-Wdowinski-OCM-2020.pdf

Several localized subsiding areas were detected mostly in the western part of the city. These areas typically consist of single-family houses that were built on reclaimed wetlands. In some locations, as in the eastern part of the city, the detected subsidence is of a 12-story high condominium building.

 

[IceIce9]

Building collapse, rain, lighting and now fire. It keeps getting more difficult for rescuers.

 

[Dontknow?]

99 feared missing in rubble of collapsed condo in Surfside as search, vigil continue

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/miami-beach/article252324218.html

 

[BetteDavisEyes]

At least 1 dead, dozens unaccounted for after high-rise collapse near Miami Beach (nbcnews.com)

Surfside Commissioner Eliana Salzhauer said search-and-rescue operations could "play out for days."

More than 50 people were unaccounted for Thursday afternoon after a high-rise condo building partially collapsed near Miami Beach, leaving at least one person dead and 10 injured, officials said.

Authorities got a call about the collapse at the 12-story building in Surfside, a town in Florida's Miami-Dade County, around 1:30 a.m. ET, officials said during a morning news conference.

Raide Jadallah, the assistant chief of operations for Miami-Dade Fire Rescue, said that of the building's 136 units, 55 in the northeast corridor collapsed...

 

[Dontknow?]

Condo building partially collapses in Miami-Dade, killing at least one and prompting mass search-and-rescue operation

The partial collapse came one day after the building had passed inspection, Surfside Vice Mayor Tina Paul told The Post. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) said engineers were examining what caused the collapse but an exact cause could take some time to determine.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/06/24/surfside-building-collapse-miami-dade/

 

[indicolite22]

WATCH: FIU Engineer Discuss Possible Cause of Surfside Condo Collapse | Y100 | Florida News

Atorod Azizinamini, chair of the FIU College of Engineering and Computing’s Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, watching the video from the scene and discussing possible causes of the building collapse in Surfside.

 

[Dontknow?]

Same article from above.

The building’s residents seemed to be a cross-section of residents emblematic of Miami’s diversity: Venezuelans, Paraguayans and people belonging to the Orthodox Jewish community. Among those unaccounted for are multiple family members of Silvana López Moreira, the first lady of Paraguay.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2021/06/24/surfside-building-collapse-miami-dade/

(I read elsewhere it was her husband & 2 children)

 

[whitelilac]

This is so horrifying....I hardly have words.
The collapse had to have been due to unstable land it was sitting on, a catastrophic failure....maybe sudden such as a sinkhole, or weakening over time.
All those people.....

 

[Chelly]

"Amazing this could happen in America". Scary that I have heard those words so many times in past few years.

 

[Lore Listener]

Here's a Twitter thread from a CBS Miami anchor, Frances Wang, showing the folks being reported to their news station as missing. She is also reporting that same 99 missing figure as the Miami Herald. I'm old enough that these missing posters/photos are a painful echo of 9/11.

https://twitter.com/FrancesWangTV/status/1408135454277484544?s=20

 

[Lore Listener]

Here's a Twitter thread from a CBS Miami anchor, Frances Wang, showing the folks being reported to their news station as missing. She is also reporting that same 99 missing figure as the Miami Herald. I'm old enough that these missing posters/photos are a painful echo of 9/11.

https://twitter.com/FrancesWangTV/status/1408135454277484544?s=20

And one more...

 

[moonriverfarm]

Collapsed Miami condo had been sinking into Earth as early as the 1990s, researchers say | USA TODAY

A Florida high rise that collapsed Wednesday night was determined to be unstable a year ago, according to a researcher at Florida International University.

Wdowinski said his research is not meant to suggest any certainty about what caused the collapse of the condominium. The building was sinking at a rate of about 2 millimeters a year in the 1990s, and the sinking could have slowed or accelerated in the time since.

“It was a byproduct of analyzing the data. We saw this building had some kind of unusual movement,” Wdownski said.

ETA: Original research article
https://faculty.fiu.edu/~swdowins/publications/Fiaschi-Wdowinski-OCM-2020.pdf

Several localized subsiding areas were detected mostly in the western part of the city. These areas typically consist of single-family houses that were built on reclaimed wetlands. In some locations, as in the eastern part of the city, the detected subsidence is of a 12-story high condominium building.

Where in this article does it mention this particular building was sinking?

 

[Chelly]

Researcher: High-rise that collapsed was sinking, due for recertification

“I looked at this morning and said ‘Oh my God.’ We did detect that,” Shimon Wdowinski, professor in the Department of Earth and Environment at Florida International University, told the newspaper.

Wdowinski said his research found the building was sinking at a rate of about 2 millimeters a year in the 1990s, and the sinking could have slowed or accelerated in the time since. The study was not done for the purpose of determining the soundness of the building but as part of an ongoing project to identify which parts of Miami could be most impacted by sea-level rise and coastal flooding.

 

[indicolite22]

Where in this article does it mention this particular building was sinking?

Its location on the map is depicted on page 4 of the original article, but the building is not named. The article author verified for USA Today that it's the building in question. He even says that he knew immediately after learning about the collapse which building was involved, because other similar buildings didn't have the same unusual sinking rate.

 

[fred&edna]

Collapsed Miami condo had been sinking into Earth as early as the 1990s, researchers say | USA TODAY

A Florida high rise that collapsed Wednesday night was determined to be unstable a year ago, according to a researcher at Florida International University.

Wdowinski said his research is not meant to suggest any certainty about what caused the collapse of the condominium. The building was sinking at a rate of about 2 millimeters a year in the 1990s, and the sinking could have slowed or accelerated in the time since.

“It was a byproduct of analyzing the data. We saw this building had some kind of unusual movement,” Wdownski said.

ETA: Original research article
https://faculty.fiu.edu/~swdowins/publications/Fiaschi-Wdowinski-OCM-2020.pdf

Several localized subsiding areas were detected mostly in the western part of the city. These areas typically consist of single-family houses that were built on reclaimed wetlands. In some locations, as in the eastern part of the city, the detected subsidence is of a 12-story high condominium building.

If I'm correctly understanding the "Concluding Remarks" in the linked pdf... it appears Norfolk VA showed even greater subsidence/affect? Does that mean Norfolk is sinking faster??

Our InSAR results show that in both communities land subsidence contributes locally to higher relative sea level rise rates. In Miami Beach, land subsidence occurred only locally and at very low rates, between 1 mm/yr and 3 mm/yr. In Norfolk, land subsidence affected a larger portion of the territory with rates up to 6 mm/yr (8 mm/yr if considering both relative and regional components). This study shows the importance of considering land subsidence as one of the principal factors that affect the spatial distribution of flooding events and their frequency in low-lying coastal communities.