Ill-Fated Miami Building Showed Signs of 'Something Off'

[JoeOtterbein]

Daily Beast

The Champlain Towers complex was the subject of at least one lawsuit, and it attracted the attention of scientists alarmed over land erosion.

Justin Rohrlich
Zoe Richards
Breaking News Reporter
Published Jun. 24, 2021 6:47PM ET

The Miami-area apartment building that crashed to the ground in a horrifying early-morning collapse Thursday had been experiencing “issues” for years, and it was even the subject of a scientific study last year that warned of it sinking into the earth.

The Champlain Towers complex in Surfside, Florida, was the subject of at least one lawsuit over the maintenance of the structure’s outer walls. In addition, the building attracted the attention of scientists alarmed over flooding and land erosion.

According to a Florida International University professor who co-authored a study focused on the issue last year, the complex had been sinking into the earth bit by bit since the 1990s, and at one point, it was sinking at a rate of about 2 millimeters per year. according to research conducted by professor Shimon Wdowinski.

Professor Shimon Wdowinski and co-author Simone Fiaschi were examining increases in flooding frequency, and found that in addition to rising sea levels, flooding was "significantly higher” in areas along the southeastern coast that had been sinking into the Earth due to urban development and compacted sediment on what was (at least in part) reclaimed marshland. At the same time, Wdowinski pointed out that “land subsidence,” or a settling of the ground, “in and of itself likely would not cause a building’s collapse.”

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more at link

[XanaDUer2]

1. There's a show, life after people

how Earth will re-assert itself, and Nature and animals will take back the land.

SE Florida is horribly built up over marshlands that were reclaimed. This will happen more and more.

RIP and thoughts to the dead and injured.

Nature always wins in the end.

[Ka-Dinh Oy]

2. I loved and miss that show.

We were thinking the same thing. I saw that and the first thing I said was "hey, Life After People!"

[brush]

3. The people in the neighboring buildings have to be worried too. I know I would be.

[Blue_true]

4. I laugh when I see people write or say "save the planet"

No, it is save ourselves. The Earth and life that survives us will be perfectly fine after we are gone.

[rambler_american]

5. An interesting book on the same subject

An interesting book on the same subject is The World Without Us

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/248787.The_World_Without_Us

[localroger]

6. The Life After People series was based on that book /nt

[JHB]

7. Episode 1 (of "I'm not sure how many")

[2naSalit]

8. I was wondering about the sinking issue.

Much of Miami area could suffer such fate as time goes on. Florida has a lot of sinkholes, I can imagine they would show in a place where there is so much weight per square foot on that sandy shelf, what could go wrong?

[rgbecker]

9. Nightmare senario: Floridians, escaping sinking state, settle throughout the US.

Florida Men everywhere. Can the US survive it? Not likely.

[appalachiablue]

10. Tx for this impt. report; what a tragedy.

[monkeyman1]

11. FLORIDA & Miami is going to be in the same boat New Orleans is ! below sea level !