There is still hope that survivors will be pulled from the collapsed condominiums in Surfside, Florida, but families are bracing for the worst, President Joe Biden said after meeting with some for four hours Thursday.
“The families are very realistic,” Biden said Thursday during remarks at the St. Regis Bal Harbour Resort, blocks from the disaster zone. “They know that the chances are, as each day goes by, diminished slightly.”
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“At a minimum, they want to recover the bodies,” he added. “There are some very religious people in there.”
BIDEN MAY POLITICIZE MIAMI CONDO DISASTER DURING VISIT
The president and first lady Jill Biden spent several hours with survivors, the families of dead and missing residents, and rescuers during their divisive visit to the traumatized community, with some victims’ families expressing concerns he made the trip.
“I sat with one woman who had just lost her husband, and her little baby boy didn’t know what to do,” he said, drawing on his own personal tragedies. “I sat with another family that lost almost the entire family, cousins, brothers, sisters.”
Biden thanked some first responders in public beforehand, urging them to be careful after the now-recovery effort turned dangerous on Thursday. Parts of the still-standing Champlain Towers South condo complex in Surfside, north of Miami, were reportedly becoming increasingly unstable one week after it fell down, prompting officials to suspend the search for survivors and victims.
“Until we need you, no one fully appreciates what you do. But I promise you — we know. We know. What you’re doing here is incredible, having to deal with the uncertainty and worrying about the families,” he said.
Biden also received a briefing from local authorities, including Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a Republican who thanked the Democratic president for his support and for announcing the federal government would pay “100% of the cost” for the first 30 days. Representatives of the Federal Emergency Management Agency have been on the site, helping people displaced by the collapse. The State Department, too, has been expediting visas for affected family members who live overseas.
DeSantis has done little to defuse talk he is one of the Republicans eager to take Biden’s job in 2024. But the political rivals are on the same side of this crisis, with the president saying he would foot most of the recovery bills — and the governor signaling he would accept.
At least 18 people are dead, and another 145 residents remain unaccounted for as rescuers work in 12-hour shifts to clear the rubble.
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A U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology investigation is now underway, but a 2018 inspection of the 12-story, 136-unit tower ahead of its 40-year recertification documented “major structural damage” to a concrete slab below its pool deck, affecting the parking garage. The condos were built in 1981.
