After the collapse of the Champlain Tower South in Surfside, Florida, the official death toll rose to nine on Sunday. In the meantime, the search for victims and survivors continues in the rubble of the residential complex north of Miami Beach not far from the Atlantic coast.
Eight bodies have so far been recovered from the rubble, and one injured person has died in the hospital. More than four days after the sudden collapse of the 12-story, 40-year-old skyscraper in the early hours of the morning on Thursday last week, over 150 residents are still missing.
Among the victims identified so far are the pensioners Antonio and Gladys Lozano, who were married for 59 years and died in their sleep together in their apartment on the ninth floor. The body of Manuel LaFont (54) was recovered on Friday. LaFont, originally from Houston, Texas, was a businessman with businesses in Latin America. Stacie Dawn Fang, 54, the first victim identified Thursday, had been struck to death by blunt force when the apartment collapsed around her. Fang’s son, teenage boy Jonah Handler, is one of only a handful of residents who were rescued by first responders from the rubble.
The search was hampered by a smoldering fire under the rubble, which was finally extinguished on Saturday. In order to facilitate the rescue work, a 12 m deep, 6 m wide and 40 m long trench is currently being pulled through the heap of rubble made of concrete, steel and household items.
New reports keep surfacing that it had been known for several years that the building structure was dilapidated and no longer secure. It stands to reason that criminal negligence played a crucial role in the context of the disaster. However, any official investigation will result in whitewashing and no one will face serious consequences – although more than 150 deaths are expected.
As early as October 2018, civil engineer Frank Morabito reported on the condition of the high-rise to the managing director of the Champlain Towers South Condominium Association, which owns and manages the building. In his remarks, he warned that the concrete slab under the deck of the swimming pool and the driveway had “major structural damage” as a result of defective moisture protection. “If the waterproofing is not replaced in the near future, the concrete will erode to a considerable extent,” wrote the engineer.
The report published by the city of Surfside on Friday evening also found that the concrete columns and walls in the parking garage under the building had cracks on several levels and whole pieces had flaked off, as a result of which the steel reinforcement had already rusted in several places.
Morabito stated that repairs were needed “to maintain the structural integrity” of the building. However, he did not indicate that a collapse was to be feared. The main conclusion of the report was that the roof must be replaced before hurricane season to avoid rain and wind damage.
When the building collapsed, roof repairs were in progress to meet Miami-Dade Township requirements for all buildings over 40 years of age. However, nothing was done about the dilapidated concrete. It took around $ 15 million to meet community repair and redevelopment requirements alone.
Donna DiMaggio Berger, an attorney for the owner company, said the Daily Mail on Friday that Morabito did not even look at the actual foundation and the floor under the building. This was not necessary for a new certification of the building. However, a 2020 analysis of satellite data from the 1990s by an engineer from Florida International University found that the building had sunk two millimeters each year. Presumably, the building has sunk more than eight centimeters in the last forty years, which of course could seriously impair the structural stability. However, despite these worrying findings, no official warning was issued.
The Champlain Towers South residential complex was built on reclaimed wetland on one of numerous barrier islands. During hurricanes and tropical storms, these islands hold off most of the wind and storm surges from the mainland. By the late 1920s, speculators had divided the sandbar between the Atlantic Ocean and North Biscayne Bay as building land, and it was on this site that the foundations of the town of Surfside were built.
When Miami-Dade County approved the construction of new buildings after a moratorium expired in 1979, the Champlain Towers North and South were the first buildings to be rebuilt in Surfside. The city’s water and sewer systems were seen as ailing, and the condominium’s builders (headed by Polish-born Canadian lawyer Nathan Reiber) paid the city $ 200,000, half the cost of a new sewer system to get the project off the ground .
As the Washington Post reported Saturday that Reiber was charged with tax evasion in Canada in the 1970s and fined $ 60,000. Reiber and one of his partners ran a real estate company in Canada. They were accused of stealing tens of thousands of dollars from coin-operated laundries and cashing in on a fraudulent construction project.
A year after the project was approved, the builders of the Champlain Towers were forced to ask two members of the city council to return campaign donations, as Reiber and his partners were accused of buying approval from the local government.
The construction of the Champlain Towers coincided with a time when the deregulation of the savings and loan industry was beginning. President Ronald Reagan’s 1981 tax cuts brought the tax benefits of real estate to the fore. Large amounts of money were poured into commercial real estate development, and construction activity soared in Florida and across the United States. The buildings were often raised quickly and cheaply.
The two major capitalist parties in the United States are responsible for the disaster at the Surfside housing estate. From 1971 to 1999, with the exception of four years, the Democratic Party provided the governor of Florida. During this time there was an unprecedented, almost uncontrolled boom in residential and commercial buildings. More recently, Republican Governor Ron DeSantis has pushed for regulation to be cut further to remove all obstacles to the exploitation of the working class. At the same time, he channeled tens of millions of dollars in government funds to private property developers.
Just hours after the Surfside apartment building collapsed, President Joe Biden announced a bipartisan infrastructure deal, but it was only a fraction of his original proposal. All funds for childcare, health care or tax rebates for families, as well as the promised increase in corporate taxes, were cut. New investments in the infrastructure in this package totaling 579 billion dollars will be awarded to private companies under the concept of a “public-private partnership”.
How many other residential complexes on the Florida coast and across the United States are currently at risk of collapse is unknown. However, the fact is that thousands of such high-rise buildings were built under similar conditions and also on unstable land. They are now exposed to increasingly severe floods and storms as a result of man-made global warming. A comprehensive inventory is urgently needed. Every residential complex needs to be carefully examined and all risks to its residents need to be identified.
As one engineer noted, the Surfside disaster must be seen as an early warning system; she must be the proverbial “canary in the mine”. It points to the consequences that the miserable state of the basic social infrastructure will produce across the country if every aspect of life continues to be subordinated to the pursuit of ever greater profit. This is particularly evident in the corona pandemic: The ruling class is pursuing a policy of “herd immunity” that made the spread of the disease possible in the first place. At least 600,000 Americans and 4 million people worldwide have succumbed to the virus.
Bridges collapse, factories explode and dams break with increasing frequency. Numerous workers have already been killed, their homes destroyed and their livelihoods destroyed. But nothing is done to solve life or death problems. Last weekend in Detroit, Michigan, several highways were flooded 15 cm deep with rain within a few hours because important pumps failed. Thousands of people were stuck in their cars. Hundreds of houses have been flooded and the belongings of numerous families have been destroyed.
Capitalism is no longer able to solve these fundamental problems. The necessity of a rational planning of the social organization is obvious. However, it is impossible under the conditions of capitalist anarchy. These fundamental problems can only be solved if the financial oligarchy is expropriated and society is democratically reorganized under workers control. Only in this way can the world’s resources be used to meet the needs of all of humanity. Safe housing, safe jobs, quality education and health care will only be possible under socialism.
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