Death toll rises in Florida building collapse, 152 still unaccounted for
- Israeli and Mexican engineers and search-and-rescue specialists have joined army of American workers at site
- Dozens of residents still missing after 12-storey oceanfront Champlain Towers South collapsed on Thursday
The death toll after the collapse of a Florida block of flats has risen to nine, the local mayor said on Sunday, more than three days after the building pancaked as residents slept.
“We were able to recover four additional bodies in the rubble … So I am confirming today that the death toll is at nine,” Miami-Dade County mayor Daniella Levine Cava told reporters in Surfside, near Miami Beach, adding that one victim had died in hospital. “We’ve identified four of the victims and notified next of kin.”
With 152 people still unaccounted for, the outlook grew more grim by the hour, and weary family members at the site were showing increasing signs of anger, despair and strain.
Cava said four bodies, as well as human remains, were found when workers dug a huge trench through the mountain of debris.
“We are making every effort to identify those others who have been recovered,” she said in a morning briefing.
Florida Governor Ron DeSantis said debris with “forensic value” is being taken to a large warehouse to be inspected as investigators seek to determine the cause of the collapse.
