A woman on a WaveRunner passes by the Champlain Towers South Condo, Sunday, June 27, 2021, in Surfside, Fla. Many people are still unaccounted for after Thursday's fatal collapse. (AP/Wilfredo Lee)
SURFSIDE, Florida — Questions mounted Monday about how a residential building in the Miami area could have collapsed so quickly and violently last week, as attention turned to a city official who deemed the tower in “very good shape,” despite a report pointing to structural issues three years ago.
Experts are looking at possible pre-existing critical flaws in the structure of the apartment tower in Surfside, near Miami Beach, which pancaked into a pile of smoking rubble in the early hours of Thursday. Some have focused on the building’s pool, where a Miami-area contractor said he spotted serious damage hours before the collapse.