Miami building collapse death toll hits 28 as storm Elsa threatens rescue effort
At least 28 people are confirmed to have died in the Miami building collapse after rescue workers pulled a further four bodies from the rubble.
The four unidentified remains were recovered from beneath the concrete of the wrecked of Champlain Towers South in Surfside on Monday and overnight.
Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said 117 people still remain missing as relief workers work around the clock to find as many people as possible before tropical storm Elsa makes arrives in Miami on Wednesday.
The violent tropical storm has already killed three people in the Caribbean and has left a trail of destruction in the likes of Barbados, the Dominican Republic and Cuba.
It’s feared that when the storm arrives in Florida – bringing with it hurricane-force winds – rescue efforts at the collapsed condo may have to come to a standstill.
‘The bad weather, unfortunately, has caused some temporary pauses of the work, specifically lightning, which, as you know, is not safe for conducting the search effort’, said mayor Daniella Cava.
She added ‘It does force us to stop to protect the safety of our first responders’ as she told reporters that so far rescue teams have been able to remove 4.8 million pounds of concrete.
The mission to rescue the remaining 117 people is entering its 13th day today after the building came crashing down in the early hours of June 24.
On Sunday engineers took the decision to demolish the portion of the building that remained standing in a controlled detonation, briefly halting the search but opening up new areas of the pile for first responders.
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Cava said the demolition of the structurally unstable final section of the building was necessary for work to continue.
Officials in Florida has warned that the approaching storm threatened to topple the structure either way, officials.
Elsa is expected to make landfall along Florida’s west coast by late Tuesday or Wednesday, bringing dangerous tropical-force winds and rain to Surfside, which neighbors Miami Beach.
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