SURFSIDE - Emergency workers heard the voice of a woman trapped under the rubble of the South Florida condo collapse hours after the disaster, officials said -- but they were unable to find her.
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Members of the South Florida Urban Search and Rescue team look for possible survivors in the partially collapsed 12-story Champlain Towers South condo building on June 25, 2021 in Surfside, Florida. Over one hundred people are being reported as missing as search-and-rescue effort continues with rescue crews from across Miami-Dade and Broward counties. |
"Everybody that was there, that’s what
we’re trying to do, get this lady out and comfort her," the
worker said. "She was asking for help and she was pleading
to be taken out of there."
He told the outlet that though they never made visual
contact, they tried verbally reassuring her that they were
going to get her out of there -- but said a wall of
concrete, metal rebar and a dumpster were in their way.
The worker told WPLG that crews never abandoned their effort
to free the trapped woman, and communicated with her for
"about 10 to 11 hours after the collapse." He said she told
them her parents were also trapped next to her.
But when a fire broke out and forced the crews to move back,
"we know she passed," he told the outlet.
An email sent by a supervisor that was obtained by the TV
station worried about the effect the loss of the woman would
have on the crew, noting that after her death, chiefs on
scene "saw the wind knocked out of our guys."
WPLG did not say if the woman has been identified in the
official death toll thus far.