topic Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning in Community Chat

Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

Mindy D — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 19:22:29 GMT

NPR has an important article. There was a meeting of residents with a Surfside official in 2018 in which the official told residents that their building was safe. Information which conflicted with a report they got five weeks earlier. Put the title in your search bar to find and read the article.
Surfside Official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe, Despite Engineer's Warning

June 27, 20211:07 PM ET

By Matthew S. Schwartz and Brian

"NPR has obtained minutes of a Nov. 2018 meeting that shows a Surfside town inspector met with residents of the building, and assured them the building was "in very good shape." NPR learned of the meeting from a resident who was in attendance and who in an interview with Weekend Edition recalled being told that the building was not in danger.

The inspector's comments directly conflicted with an engineering report from five weeks earlier, which warned that failed waterproofing in a concrete structural slab needed to be replaced "in the near future.""

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

Mistreatedbycs — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 19:23:19 GMT

@Mindy D oh my, what i was reading was that the inspection reports actually read the opposite. So sad.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

elated — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 19:26:43 GMT

I responded to this under Condo in Miami. Please read my posts. People have been lied to about this building. Someone knew the true facts but failed to let the residents know.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

golding76 — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 19:28:02 GMT

You should not -- must not -- lie to the people. Sooner or later, truth will out.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

decaf — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 19:34:12 GMT

@elated wrote:
I responded to this under Condo in Miami. Please read my posts. People have been lied to about this building. Someone knew the true facts but failed to let the residents know.

Happens every day here in S Fl. No surprise.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

MarieIG — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 19:34:49 GMT

Who hired the structual engineer who found the defects? Was it the Board?

If so, and the Board was on notice of all these defects, it sounds rather suspect that someone would be brought in from the town to contradict the engineer. Who invited the town inspector to the Board meeting? And if there was any doubt, it would seem that further inspections by an impartial structural engineering firm ASAP would have been warranted.

It is possible that the sink hole caused this, and it would have happened even had the repair been made, but why take a chance with peoples lives?

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

On It — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 19:35:47 GMT

@golding76 wrote:
You should not -- must not -- lie to the people. Sooner or later, truth will out.

The tragedy is that some have the attitude that they are not going to let those pesky facts get in the way of their opinion or greed.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

ValuSkr — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 20:01:47 GMT

I think Board members knew the real situation and delayed taking action because of the cost - it would have required bank financing and a multi-year special assessment on owners. They will be culpable to some degree; anyone in that position should carry D&O liability insurance, And I think the Condominium Association itself will be liable - it is nothing more than the owners but surely carries its own liabilty insurance.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

shoesnbags — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 20:16:40 GMT

I read an article about the 2018 engineering report yesterday. There were a number of quotes from the report, and the owner of the engineering firm was interviewed about the report they tendered.

It was very clear that they were pointing out serious problems that needed to be addressed sooner rather than later. The idea that anyone would think they could just ignore this kind of warning is appalling.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

LuvmyLab — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 20:18:22 GMT

I saw on the news today that the owners of the building knew back in 2016 that it wasn't safe. Inexcusable.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

Goodie2shoes — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 20:21:26 GMT

Such a tragedy ! So many families have lost love ones and that's the main story. The engineers, inspectors etc will blame each other for years to come and move on but the families who lost their love ones will never forget. Prayers for the families

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

Greeneyedlady21 — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 20:30:27 GMT

Such a horrific tragedy. I can't even watch news reports, it's too painful.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

Mindy D — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 22:34:57 GMT

Another good article about the possible structural problems and their causes. Just copy and paste the title in your search bar.

Building collapse in Miami: Multiple factors could have contributed, experts say

Kyle Bagenstose, Elizabeth Weise, Erin Mansfield, Aleszu Bajak

USA TODAY

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

golding76 — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 20:38:44 GMT

Mindy D,

I am unable to read USA Today because I do not allow ads.

Darn!

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

MarieIG — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 21:16:02 GMT

@Mindy D Yes, good article Mindy. I expect it will take a while until we get a full report.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

ValuSkr — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 21:30:51 GMT

@LuvmyLab wrote:
I saw on the news today that the owners of the building knew back in 2016 that it wasn't safe. Inexcusable.

The "owners of the building" is the Condominium Association, i.e. the people who own the building's units. Their elected representatives are the Board of Directors, who typically hire a management company to handle finances and day-to-day details.

At least that's how it works here. Maybe it's different in Florida.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

kaydee50 — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 22:00:29 GMT

If I were in the "sister" building to the one that collapsed, I would be gone by now. Does anyone know what people paid for their apartments? Or what they rent for???

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

Mindy D — Mon, 28 Jun 2021 04:34:37 GMT

I'm withholding judgement. This looks multifactorial to me and it's very possible that each specialist either did not know about findings from other specialists, did not agree with other findings, or partially agreed with other specialists but felt that things did not need immediate attention to avoid a collapse and that the association could wait until all information, the 40 year certification and bids were in. The board had an open bidding meeting with contractors on June 15th.

The condo board was probably acting upon the recommendations coming from different experts and differing opinions. The board was also unaware that the building was sinking 2mm or more per year from 1993-1999. THIS IS CALLED SUBSIDENCE. This was not known until 2020 and was only noticed by the Florida International University study on flooding as a result if the use of satellite imagery.The building could have been especially vulnerable if the ground it was situated on was sinking at different rates, causing differential settlement. The engineers and inspectors were also not aware of this finding. The inspector for the engineering consulting firm that said that pool deck was in seriously bad shape thought that it was necessary to get the work done soon, quickly, but did not foresee the collapse or mention the potential for a collapse. This is in the report. You have salty sea air that disintegrates metal rebar. You have concrete that spalls in the presence of sea air and air in general. You have a pool deck that might have had a faulty repair or for some other reason was allowing water into the slab, you have NO REQUIREMENT FOR CONCRETE TO BE CHECKED FOR CHEMICAL DEGRADATION AT THE FORTY YEAR RECERTIFICATION OR AT ANY OTHER TIME. I don't see any evidence of lying. I see evidence that it was taking considerable time to get all the information needed to proceed with the work. The Surfside town inspector could have interpreted the study from the engineering consultant to mean that for the time being the place was safe because the engineering report never said that the building was unsafe. I do think that he couldn't have been well informed if he told the residents that the building was in very good shape. It is certainly possible that he knew better and was just lying to reassure the residents.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

Mindy D — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 22:08:35 GMT

@kaydee50 wrote:
If I were in the "sister" building to the one that collapsed, I would be gone by now. Does anyone know what people paid for their apartments? Or what they rent for???

@kaydee50 @Not necessarily. A contributing factor could be SUBSIDENCE, the sinking of the ground below the building. Only the building that collapsed, and not its twin, was observed to have been undergoing subsidence on satellite imagery. If the collapsed building had parts sinking unevenly it could result in structure failure which would be sort of like what is observed in an earthquake when the ground gives out below part of a structure.

Re: Surfside official Told Residents Their Building Was Safe Despite Engineer’s Warning

agb80 — Sun, 27 Jun 2021 22:31:41 GMT

It was reported that water was coming in through closed windows. Residents didn't see that as a serious problem?