Surfside building collapse update

Today, Miami-Dade County released the following update on the Surfside building collapse response and recovery:

Search and recovery

The teams continue making progress on search and recovery – over 26 million pounds of debris and concrete have now been removed.

As of today, July 15, 92 victims have been identified and 92 families have been notified. 240 people are accounted for; 97 missing persons reports were opened with the Miami-Dade Police Department.

At this step in the recovery process it has become increasingly difficult to identify victims, and we are relying heavily on the work of the medical examiner’s office and the scientific, technical process of identifying human remains. This work becomes more difficult with the passage of time although our teams are working as hard and as fast as they can.

Moving forward, out of respect for the families who are still waiting and to ensure we are reporting the most accurate possible numbers, we will only be reporting the number of victims who have been identified.

Family Assistance and Resources

19 families were served today at the Family Assistance Center (FAC); 21 agencies were active at the center, and 243 unique families have received services through the FAC in total.

Today, we also began offering COVID testing at the FAC, and 30 provider representatives and family members were tested.

We continue to receive applications for unmet needs through the online portal created to support families, Surfside Assistance.

Investigation

The investigation into what caused the collapse of the Surfside condominium is being conducted by the National Institutes of Standards and Technology – the federal agency authorized to conduct technical investigations of building failures, issue reports and make recommendations to improve building codes and standards – with the assistance of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. We have a large team of engineers and other forensic experts from NIST and other federal agencies on site performing extensive testing, measurements, photographing and 3D imaging, and collection and tagging of evidentiary materials, to collect as much data as possible to support the full investigation.