Sharjah24 – Reuters: The official death toll from the partial collapse of a high-rise condominium complex near Miami rose to nine on Sunday, with more than 150 people still missing, as rescue teams picked through the rubble for a fourth day without detecting further signs of life.
What caused nearly half the 12-story, 156-unit building to cave in in the early hours of Thursday as residents slept has yet to be determined, but a 2018 engineer's inspection report found major structural deterioration in the parking garage beneath the 40-year-old tower.
Officials in Surfside, the shore town near Miami where the building stood along the beach, said hope remained that rescuers would yet discover survivors in air pockets that may have formed in the pancaked debris.
Even so, Fire Chief Alan Cominsky said on Sunday that crews had yet to find such voids in the rubble or signs of anyone alive since early in the tragedy, when faint sounds were detected.
Two large cranes and two backhoes on Sunday joined in the debris-removal efforts that had previously been conducted essentially by hand by teams also using rescue dogs, sonar, drones and infrared scanners as they gingerly tunneled through the ruins.
The teams included experts sent by Israel and Mexico to assist in the search. An American flag atop one crane rippled in the stiff ocean breeze.
Given the scores of those still missing, the disaster may end up to be one of the deadliest non-deliberate structural failures in U.S. history.
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