Condo collapse: 3 of youngest Surfside collapse victims identified as death toll reaches 90

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The tragic news came after authorities announced that they had identified a total of 71 victims and informed their families.

A total of 217 people have now been counted in the collapse and 31 people are still potentially missing, Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said at a daily press briefing.

A video of the Champlain South Towers collapse site taken on Sunday evening showed crews still digging through the debris, with searchlights lighting their way.

Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett said teams found personal items such as rings in the rubble they cataloged to return to family members.

The efforts of the search and rescue teams have been applauded by members of the community awaiting news of the collapse.

Members of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) The National Rescue Unit receives a shipment of search and rescue personnel July 10 in Surfside, Florida.

On Saturday evening, local clergy, elected officials, first responders and the families of victims and survivors as well as members of Hatzalah, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) and the Israeli consulate gathered for a ceremony and a memorial march. to thank the rescuers for their efforts. .

IDF operatives, who were there to help with the collapse recovery efforts, received a farewell during the march.

Crews have worked tirelessly since the June 24 collapse to recover the casualties, only stopping due to safety concerns such as a pile of moving debris, dangerous storm winds and lightning.

These efforts have helped Pablo Rodriguez, who said he was relieved to learn what happened to his mother and grandmother weeks after their disappearance in the collapse.

“Last night was (the) first night since the start of this nightmare where I got to get some sleep,” Rodriguez said in a Tweeter Saturday, after authorities identified Elena Chavez, 87, and Elena Blasser, 64, as two of the victims.

“The thought that they went through weighs heavily on me and the confirmation that they didn’t was a ‘relief’,” he said. “It was the best bad news I could get in this situation. I just hope I got.”

The youngest victims

Authorities identified three of the youngest victims on Sunday, including 5-year-old Lorenzo De Oliveira Leone.

Anna Sophia Pettengill Lopez Moreira, 6, and her sister Alexia Maria Pettengill Lopez Moreira, 9, were both recovered on July 7 and publicly identified on Sunday. The girls were the last two members of their family to be identified.

Their brother, Luis Vicente Pettengill Lopez Moreira III, 3, the youngest victim of the collapse, was found on July 7 and identified on Friday.

Sophia López Moreira, the mother of the children, was the sister of the First Lady of Paraguay and lived with her husband, three children and her nanny on the 10th floor of the South Champlain Towers.

She and her husband Luis Pettengill, 36, as well as Leidy family nanny Vanessa Luna Villalba, 23, were identified in an earlier statement.

Notes are written on a makeshift gravestone for Francis Fernandez, victim of the collapse.

Paraguayan President Mario Abdo Benítez arrived in the United States on Friday after learning that his wife’s family had died in the collapse.

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“I regret and unfortunately have to report the discovery of the lifeless bodies of Sophia López Moreira, Luis Pettengil and the youngest of their children,” Paraguay’s Foreign Minister Euclides Acevedo told TV station last week. Paraguayan Telefuturo.

Four other children aged 4 to 11 have been identified in recent weeks, including sisters Emma Guara, 4, and Lucia Guara, 11, who were buried in the same coffin last week. They were recovered and identified on June 30.

Safety issues for other buildings

While the collapse prompted building inspections across the county, concerns over the collapsed Champlain South Towers twin building have been allayed by recent inspections.

Burkett said inspections of the Champlain North Towers – where a voluntary evacuation was issued following the collapse – have yielded positive results so far.

Evidence of Surfside condo collapse accumulates day by day, but investigation could take years

“The first results on concrete are that the strength of the concrete is very good,” Burkett said on Sunday. “At or beyond the levels it should be at.”

In the days immediately following the collapse, the county and neighboring towns began requiring building owners to inspect their buildings and submit recertifications for buildings of a certain height and age. .

The push has already resulted in the evacuation of a condominium in North Miami Beach and the closure of a 1920s courthouse in downtown Miami.

Natasha Chen, Kevin Conlon, Deanna Hackney of CNN and Sanie López Garelli and Marlon Sorto of CNNe contributed to this report.

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