Surfside Condo Collapse Started Three Weeks Before Tragedy

The partial collapse of the Champlain Towers South condo in Surfside started roughly three weeks before the building fell, according to federal investigators.

The National Institute of Standards and Technology released a report Monday concluding that a structural failure first occurred at two critical garage column connections beneath the pool deck in early June 2021, the Wall Street Journal reported.

That initial failure triggered an undetected, slow-motion chain reaction that ultimately claimed 98 lives, and the report confirms what many engineers had long suspected. Investigators found that when the slab-to-column connections failed, the pool deck’s concrete slab started to quietly warp and break over a 21-day period, progressively shifting substantial weight onto adjacent columns.

Judith Mitrani-Reiser, one of the investigators, said buildings are designed with required safety margins intended to prevent collapse. In the case of Champlain Towers South, however, those margins were too narrow from the outset.

The pool deck ultimately gave way on June 24, 2021, pulling down a significant portion of the 12-story oceanfront condo.

Federal investigators determined that the building’s vulnerabilities stemmed from flaws in its original design, which failed to meet the codes and standards in place at the time of construction. The building was further weakened by deviations during construction, investigators found.

Additional strain came in the 1990s, when heavy landscape planters and thick paving stones were added to the pool deck, placing tons of unaccounted-for weight on the already deficient slab. Those additions, combined with decades of corrosion and deterioration, ultimately led to the collapse nearly 40 years after the building was completed.

In the weeks leading up to the disaster, the building displayed warning signs that went undiagnosed, according to the report. They included a sliding glass door that popped out of its frame, entry gates that became misaligned and jammed shut, and an increase in water leaking through the garage ceiling in the hours before the collapse.

The federal report comes years after Dubai-based Damac Properties purchased the site and announced the redevelopment of the former Champlain Towers South into a luxury condo.

Yet five years after the collapse and over a year after launching sales, the project has yet to secure any buyers, The Real Deal reported in April.

Damac, led by founder Hussain Sajwani, launched sales of the planned development, called The Delmore, in early 2025. The 12-story, 37-unit oceanfront condominium is planned for the 1.8-acre site at 8777 Collins Avenue in Surfside.

The developer paid $120 million for the property in 2022 through a court-ordered auction, roughly a year after the collapse. Damac was the sole bidder for the site, with proceeds from the sale distributed to unit owners and the families of victims who died in the disaster.

The sale and planned redevelopment have remained controversial. Many community members advocated for the property to become a permanent memorial to the victims, while local developers and brokerages largely steered clear of the site because of the stigma associated with the tragedy.

Damac tapped Zaha Hadid Architects to design The Delmore and hired Douglas Elliman to lead sales and marketing. The sales team includes Tara West and Farid Moussalem.

Units start at $15 million and average between $35 million and $40 million, according to Rossely. Penthouse residences could command more than $150 million. —Eman Elshahawy