Compounding factors reduced the margins of safety providing protection against failure in the pool deck of the Champlain Towers South condominium in Surfside, Fla., before its partial collapse on June 24, 2021 that killed 98 people, federal investigators looking into the causes of the building failure say.
Issues with the pool deck, such as a possible failure in the connections between the pool deck slab and columns, are among about two-dozen hypotheses being investigated by a team from the U.S. Dept. of Commerce’s National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), said Glenn Bell, associate lead investigator. Some evidence indicates the pool deck may have collapsed prior to the 12-story tower, but that is still being examined as investigators work to timestamp videos down to the second, said Judith Mitrani-Reiser, investigation team lead.