Surfside official told residents building was safe, despite engineer's warning
npr.org
npr.org
This is straight up quote mining as far as I'm concerned. Nothing in the report would lead me to believe the structure was in imminent danger if I were a resident / board member / inspector etc.
This is trash journalism.
Edit: I would like to note the following for people following this story:
The report author has stated:
“among other things, our report detailed significant cracks and breaks in the concrete, which required repairs to ensure the safety of the residents and the public.” [1]
However, such language about 'safety of the residents' is not present in his report. It has further been reported that the report author did not make such disclosures to residents at a condo board meeting.
"Not once did Morabito share with us any sense of urgency, at least not the residents," Alvarez said, who lived on the 10th floor. "He never said the building was falling apart. He said the repairs were to bring the building up to today's standards of beauty." [2]
1. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/surfside-condos-neighbors-...
2. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/surfside-official-was-sent...
The whole area is sinking, quite quickly overall. It's just common sense to disregard the results of any report deeming any building in the area 'safe', when the local government has been religiously denying that climate change even exists at all, and the insurance companies and report writers all have a short-term incentive to pretend nothing is wrong.
I have not read the report. But I also don't need the report to know that no building in the area is safe enough for me to want to live there.
The joint sealant was observed to be beyond its useful life and are in need of complete replacement. However, the waterproofing below the Pool Deck & Entrance Drive as well as all of the planter waterproofing is beyond its useful life and therefore must all be completely removed and replaced. The failed waterproofing is causing major structural damage to the concrete structural slab below these areas. Failure to replace the waterproofing in the near future will cause the extent of the concrete deterioration to expand exponentially.
Edit - this is text from the actual report - not sure why the downvotes.
When I read those sentences as a layman, they don't tell me the building may collapse.
If I were writing a report on a piece of software for my boss and I found unsanitized inputs to an SQL database, I wouldn't highlight that any more than anything else I found as he would know that was severe.
Given the context and formatting, this warning seems more like a pro-forma CYA than anything else.
If there is risk that a component failure leads to systematic failure, I would expect that a report would delineate that risk.
It may be equally likely the next lot underground garage construction shifted the ground near the condo and caused it's collapse.
I wouldn't expect this paragraph to have anything to do with a tower collapsing. Pools-in-the-air (over a garage) are notoriously leaky. I read this section to say "the pool might leak if the bottom lacks structural integrity."
In no way would I think "the pool deck is holding up the towers next door."
[0] https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/graphics/2021/06/24/florid...
> The failed waterproofing is causing major structural damage to the concrete structural slab below these areas. Failure to replace the waterproofing in the near future will cause the extent of the concrete deterioration to expand exponentially.
I agree that it doesn't say "it'll fall apart right this moment" (and well... it did take like 2 more years), but I would wonder why anyone would receive a report with the above phrasing and not seek clarification.
That all being said, we don't know if this specific thing was meaningfully involved in the collapse.
If I were writing a report on a piece of software for my boss and I found unsanitized inputs to an SQL database, I wouldn't highlight that any more than anything else I found as he would know that was severe.
Sure, but as software people we don't have a licensing body that will revoke our license to practice for such an omission. The firm and the author are likely required by their license to operate to make such call outs.
*edit: Also I would add that an engineering firm that believed the building was in imminent danger would not go forward with a project without calling that out and pricing it. They wouldn't touch it with a 10 foot pole because they would be on the hook if the building failed.
What omission are you talking about?
My point is that _if_ the engineer believed the building was at risk of catastrophic failure they would have stated as much.
It seems like maybe the report author(s) did state as much when they said “major structural damage”. I don’t know anything about architecture but, for example, when an accounting firm issues an adverse audit opinion they don’t say “this company is totally screwed!” they say “these financial statements contain material and pervasive misstatements.” It sounds boring and benign to most people but it’s the CPA equivalent of a red alert.
Exactly. Joe Blow building manager is not a structural engineer. The comment about "major structural damage" at the end of report was probably not even read. The beginning of the document is about paint bubbles and 'the tile makes the rail too short'. That sets the context.
The article casts a building department administrator as having some dire knowledge of the building condition and simultaneously telling residents everything is fine. But a close examining of the situation leads me to believe the building department administrator had no such indication.
Are you for real?
Put yourself in the shoes of a building administrator responsible for oversight of hundreds to thousands of properties. You get a report like this, on a relatively young building and it looks very ho-hum.
But NPR is presenting it with hindsight bias and acting as if there was something ominous in the report. There simply wasn't... and the story is just gotcha journalism.
If building managers don’t take rapid action to further assess and monitor the conditions after being told that, then it sounds like willful negligence.
And if this is not the case, then I am seriously questioning how safe buildings actually are.
Btw, what happened with that brand new bridge in Florida that collapsed and killed people a couple years ago. Were there any actual consequences to those responsible?
Edit: A NYT article on what’s currently known does make it seem like the pool and garage may have been the catalysis of the collapse. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/27/us/miami-building-investi...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florida_International_Universi...
I would. And as someone reading the report, even as an expert, I would want and expect the person writing it to organize it by severity, and start by pointing out any urgent items.
What advantage is there to not doing that?
I'm not a Civ E, but I have worked in aerospace and software and seen reports in both fields that contain warnings of potentially catastrophic problems use similar language as the report:
The joint sealant was observed to be beyond its useful life and are in need of complete replacement. However, the waterproofing below the Pool Deck & Entrance Drive as well as all of the planter waterproofing is beyond its useful life and therefore must all be completely removed and replaced. The failed waterproofing is causing major structural damage to the concrete structural slab below these areas. Failure to replace the waterproofing in the near future will cause the extent of the concrete deterioration to expand exponentially.
It takes an astounding lack of responsibility to say "well they never said the major structural deficiencies were going to cause an imminent collapse! And why was it buried on page 7, and not in bold font?"
> Kilsheimer said he didn’t believe the damage highlighted in the 2018 report could have led to the collapse of the building. “Nothing in it raised a red flag,” he said.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/condo-collapse-sunda...
The NPR article was just simplifying. True, the original report didn't use those exact 3 words - but what it did say:
Failure to replace the waterproofing in the near future will cause the extent of the concrete deterioration to expand exponentially.
Is quite damning, and essentially in line with the simplified version given in the NPR article. And in any case directly at odds by the town's building official:
"Structural engineer report was reviewed by Mr. Prieto. It appears the building is in very good shape."
Which may explain why Mr Prieto is "no longer employed by Surfside".
Page 7 talks about the parking garage: "Abundant cracking and spalling of varying degrees was observed concrete columns, beams, and walls. Several sizeable spalls were noted in both the topside of the entrance drive ramp underside of the pool / entrance drive / planter slabs, included instances with exposed, deteriorating rebar Though some of this damage is minor, most of the concrete deterioration needs to be repaired in a timely fashion."
Page 8 has relevant photos.
The NPR article seems to focus on the deck slabs, but they are not particularly load-bearing so are unlikely to be the cause of the building to collapse. Edit: I guess it is possible the failure of a deck slab could collapse the columns inwards, but my guess is that the columns failed (bending or collapsing).
Spalling on columns is a problem, especially if it is due to the column starting to fail.
Disclaimer: I am not a structural engineer.
TOTAL SUMMARY OF REMEDIATION PROBABLE CONSTRUCTION COST $9,128,433.60
Was this like the only building in the city to have such a bad report?
Or do a sizable amount of buildings get warnings like this?
It's probably not the only one to get such a report.
I'm sure those have already been filed with the state if they exist, we'll see a fancy visualization from a major newspaper.
The millennium tower in SF for instance, has been sinking and tilting for years, could probably just suddenly collapse one day not unlike this building in Surfside. The carnage would be immense though, as it is a massive building.
At the end of the day, if you want full peace of mind you need to live in your own detached home and be aware of your own buildings issues and correct them.
Why did this building collapse?
Well, typically, they don't collapse.
Edit: I don't understand the downvotes. Care to explain where you disagree? If thousands of daily reports warn of damage that must be fixed immediately and most are of no consequences (obviously) then the problem is that the reports don't accurately reflect the severity of the damage and the consequences of ignoring it.
Yes, it's publicly available and even linked to in this thread.
It’s linked in the thread and is very readable.
The report is rather matter of fact and lays out on page 7 what the problem was and what needs to happen to fix. This was 2018. Because a lot is unknowable these reports don’t tend to give a timeline for structural failure, but it does give some serious warnings.
Anyone that's ever gone to a mechanic knows getting inspection come from the place that's supposed to do the work is a crap shoot.
Something that has really put me off of license requirements is the relish that I have seen inspectors take in telling people they're going to need tens of thousands in renovations to bring a home up to code. Some of these items are things like "window sill does not go far enough inside."
That being said, you may be right, but I don't see anything that supports the parent comment's assertion about it being widespread enough to affect decisions around making repairs, especially in situations where the building is structurally not sound.
Insurance and the threat of lawsuits keep the engineering part of the business pretty clean.
I think your conflating them with city inspectors which come by and make sure construction is up to code.
We can also look at this from the lens of outcomes if we lean too far one way or the other with our approach to safety standards - too strict, and we allocate money poorly. Too lax, and people die.
> Obviously there is a problem with the credibility of the reports because of conflicting incentives. Inspectors are usually from construction companies who want to get work, so they will always find something wrong with a building.
Responding for myself: I have read many such reports, met inspectors, and never ever had the perception which you label an "obvious problem." In my experience, HN doesn't take well to aspersions cast without supporting evidence, much less unsubstantiated aspersions qualified as "obvious."
Hope that helps.
> If thousands of daily reports warn of damage that must be fixed immediately and most are of no consequences (obviously)
is correct, but your conclusion:
> then the problem is that the reports don't accurately reflect the severity of the damage and the consequences of ignoring it.
does not follow. To put this in probabilistic terms, you need to consider the expected value of the consequences, not just the probability.
Here one of the terms in that equation is the negative cost of killing 150 people. That cost is so high that even a fractional percent chance of building collapse means that the recommendation to fix immediately is credible, correct, and does accurately reflect the consequences of ignoring it.
The report makes clear that the integrity of the balconies on the residential structure couldn't be verified due to additional flooring materials installed by condo owners.
Reminds me of this comment about how scientists sometimes understate how certain they are: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VG_s2PCH_c&t=785s.
Most buildings like this hire a management company to deal talk with the engineers and beside the report let the building know what it happening.
a resident in the article says they took a 15 million dolllar assessment for repairs. So it’s not like it was being ignored.
Also I’m wondering how the building insurers were handled.
We had to replace a beam after extensive water damage in our 35 unit building. The units above were evacuated. Nothing collapsed but between the mold and water damage it was a nightmare.
The building that collapsed had an twin. Supposedly better maintained but it will be interesting to see what’s going on with it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/26/us/miami-building-collaps...