Miami Building Collapse, my idea for faster rescues

As a person who trained in high angle rescue, low angle rescue, confine space rescue. Technical rescues etc. I can tell you there is no easy way to safely and quickly remove a pancake collapsed building. And do a search and rescue.
One needs all of their senses. Sight, hearing, knowledge etc in such rescues. Running heavy machinery takes the hearing out of the equation. Dust being created takes sight and confine space searches out of the picture. It no longer becomes a rescue or a valid recovery. But just a site clean up.
Do some research on valid sites before making wild comments or arm chair calls. Unless you have been involved in such emergency calls or training don't make judgment calls of what you don't understand.

 

Perhaps some cynicism, if you will, comes from the assumption that decisions are being influenced by PR who wants to CYA more than they should be.
I don't question technical people know the best way humanity knows so far to save lives, stabilize the environment, remove waste, etc. The challenge is to convince me the Powers That Be aren't forcing too many technicians to do photo ops.

 

It seems that since the controlled implosion of the remainder of the building yesterday, they're able to get to the deeper parts of the collapse, and are recovering (finding) victims quicker. I wonder if they should have demolished the part of the building that was left standing first, but hindsight is 20/20. It's just so tragic, and sounds like it could have been prevented if they had maintained the building all those years.

 

The PR factor: What you see is the media looking for news coverage. If they can grab a person that has been rotated out ( R & R ) and do a interview it falls right into what THEY want for the nightly news report. There is always the one up on the other networks going on. And that is what you are getting in a lot of cases.
The R&R rotations is normal. It takes a beating on the rescuers and to be able to rotate people in and out in such a long, time consuming operation is a blessing.

 

I'll add this to the big picture ............

If anyone thinks MONEY doesn't play a role in building permits being issued, or in inspections being "passed", or in building codes being weakened or ignored ................. you're horribly ignorant of the reality on the ground. I once asked a construction superintendent (on a site I was working on) what would happen if they failed an upcoming inspection. His response TO ME was....... "We'll just buy another inspector." That wasn't "hearsay" by way of several people.

I could list numerous other examples of shoddy, unsafe practices that I've witnessed - or been instructed to perform / omit ....... but refused to do - from other job sites. But it would bore most folks.

MONEY rules everything - integrity is a relic of times past. The world of big business.

 

Agree - and the town inspector during that time stated that the building was ''in great shape.'' Case in point. It will take a while to figure out who all the bad actors were, but many are blaming the residents, which isn't fair. They may not have known the level of structural damage that there was, and quite a few people were renters, with owners living in another country.

I don't think an HOA should be handling something of this magnitude, tbh. $15 million in potential structural damage, that just seems like it's way out of their league to handle, and should have been a government matter. (at the top, not the easily paid off town inspectors, etc) It will take a while to sort it all out.

 

If the north sister tower has the same small support columns then I can see it being condemned. Soon there will be more stringent inspections and more costly maintenance and repairs for buildings to pass. Also, newer doesn't always mean better and safer either. So many points of failure, these high rises are only as safe as the most incompetent crooked contractor who stepped on to the construction site. I would imagine that the banks own a large portion of many of these condos, as with most real estate. Banks love to let building go to rot. Top dollar or abandon and decay. They don't want to finance repairs. Why bother when you own the building next door, and now it's worth more next to an empty lot.

 

The north ''sister'' building looks to be in way better shape than the building that collapsed. Just from aerial shots, even. One of the building managers took journalists through the garage for a tour, and it looked like they're really keeping up with the maintenance. I like the beach, but with rising sea levels, and salt air, it's really risky to live in those high rises on or near the ocean. I heard today that they called off the search and rescue, and now it will be search and recovery. My heart breaks for all those families who won't have any closure, even though there was little hope that anyone survived that type of collapse.

 

The ONLY people that should be involved in building inspections are actual CERTIFIED, PROVEN engineers. (And NOT the 2 year community college, "certificate program" graduates. Not nearly enough education there.)

ALL inspections done at any point - from new building completion to ongoing inspections should be video-taped with WRITTEN sign-offs for all engineers involved. That way a paper-trail & a video trail of evidence is secured to establish WHOEVER said a building is "safe." Passing the buck down to some low-level person - or worse, to the tenants themselves (!!!) (WTF???) - should NEVER happen. Video / audio-camming EVERY inspection would eliminate questions over responsibility it the case of structural failure.

Many seaside condos and hotels have been constructed with what looks like slightly-beefier scaffolding material. I've seen this myself. It's done because it's much CHEAPER to use that tinker-toy-type support structure than real steel columns and I-beams. Just what you want for a high-rise, multi-story building ................. cheaper, flimsier support structures!! Considering the salt air (corrosive) environment, I'd never want to live in such a building!!!!!!

Cash money "talks" when it comes to building design / building inspections being listed as "passed."

 

finished concrete + water = not good , add salt from the sea air and more moisture even worse
I used to test concrete down here, the lengths companies will go to to save pennies would scare you

 

Agree. I wonder how the insurance carrier who insured the building itself will deal with the lawsuits that follow. They were just renewing the policy over and over again without sending their own inspectors to verify the condition? I’m not sure if much has been uncovered about their part in this, but they look pretty guilty too if they just kept pushing the paperwork through to renew the policy on that building. Just seems odd that they wouldn’t be super diligent since they have such an investment as the insurer.

 

They've already started scaring me.

 

Most people - sadly - have no conscience these days. I can't fathom how someone / some business / inspection agency can sign off on something that's obviously not safe. The building DID NOT certify itself.

In my career, I've been ordered to NOT install code-required hangers and supports on conduit systems because, " ......... they're above a suspended ceiling. Nobody's going to see that!!!" To shut the superintendent up, and get him off my back, I said "OK" - and when he left, I continued to install hangers and supports AS THE CODE REQUIRES. I was not about to do the wrong thing, as I was told to do. I have to live with myself.

The very same thing happened again on a different job site, with a different superintendent. I told him to his face that if he wanted less supports for conduits, he'd have to climb a ladder and remove the ones I'm going to install as the National Electrical Code requires. He was pissed, but he walked away and didn't bother me again.

Here's the kicker ............. both addition / renovation job sites were SCHOOLS !!!!!!!!! Who's watching over YOUR kids' school building projects??????