Cause of Miami condo collapse unclear, but experts say barrier islands present risks
There are more questions than answers after a 12-story building collapsed in Surfside, Florida, Thursday, leaving at least four people dead and 11 injured. More than 150 people are still unaccounted for in the small Miami Beach community.
Local officials appeared to have few ideas so far about what may have caused the 136-unit building to inexplicably crumble. Scientists, however, have long noted the risk of building on the shifting sands of a barrier island like Miami Beach, especially with rising sea levels. That may not be the reason for this collapse, but it remains an engineering challenge in the region.
Surfside’s mayor, Charles Burkett, told reporters that he often jogged by the condo building, which was built in the early 1980s. He said he knew it had undergone some minor construction and roof work that included a recent crane, but he noted that many buildings undergo similar maintenance.
“There’s no reason for this building to go down like that,” Burkett said, “unless someone literally pulls out the supports from underneath, or they get washed out, or there’s a sinkhole or something like that, because it just went down.”
