Analysis Garage Video BEFORE Condo Collapse: Water Everywhere 

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despite the limitations of her recording technique , she still did a hell of a job showing us this garage, this is precious footage, also, she even kept it a year, ( when pre collapse many people would have simply deleted it)

"If you don't tell water where to go... it will always take the most expensive action" You've got that right Jeff!!!

I’ll never again look at water in an underground parking lot without fearing for my life.

I'm a Public Adjuster, damage consultant and represented the North Tower in the past. 20 plus years in the ins damage business. I've represented and handled numerous claims involving condo associations in Florida. Here's my two cents on this horrific incident. First, one of the worse ideas is to design planters on a 2nd level concrete deck in Florida. Its a maintenance nightmare that causes progressive deterioration to the concrete slab, hence one of many reasons for the water intrusion in the garage and flaking ceiling paint. By the way, covered cars in the garage are usually owned by snowbirds, 2nd homes. This building has miles of piping and chases all lead to the garage, so any water leaks from above units end up in the garage. Consider ocean tidal change, regular storms, planters and a exposed concrete pool deck, this building required consistent and extensive upkeep with proper water proofing, which can be very expensive and unit owners don't want to pay for an assessment. Still no excuse. I've witnessed fist fights at condo meetings. Unreal, I could write a 12 book series on my experience in dealing with an association board. The tourist video, the severed pipe is a 6" drain line, possibility from roof's scuppers and condensation lines. Sprinkler lines are pressured lines, so clearly the water flow is from a drain. The weight load of the pipe hangers attached to a weakened support beam may have contributed to it falling in the garage (in video) just before the collapse. Kudos to the tourist that bravely took the video, it will help with the investigation. They must be traumatized. Ceiling cracks in the garage appear to be previous repairs with epoxy injections, however water still migrating. Its a standard repair to slab cracks. Engineer should have set a protocol to repair structural slab cracks. Notice in the video, there is water running down a column. Video 22.28. Ceiling paint flakes are usually caused by moisture in the slab or paint was improperly applied to the concrete. The pool itself and equipment room is on grade and thus had nothing to do with this incident, however paints an ugly picture of lack of maintenance by the association with progressive concrete spalling. Possible gross negligence by the association, therefore the CGL policy and a separate liability policy for errors and omissions by the condo board. It doesn't look good for them. The 1st party ins carrier, which will be a different carrier from the liability will be hit with a total loss 40 to 50 million. In most cases, several carriers take on this type of risk under layered coverage Ei. percentage of risk. Each unit owner should have their own policy, that provides coverage for personal property and betterments. That's all cabinets, tiling flooring and paint ETC. Plus, additional living expenses. Those carriers should tender total loss payments immediately to the policyholders. Its going to be a litigation nightmare for all parties. Its all premature until the proximate cause of the collapse is confirmed. Still need to rule out construction defect with materials used and/or design specs. Top engineer commented that the rebar slab ties to the column may have been deficient. This adds lateral support to the structure. He was unable to confirm it until all debris is removed from the area. They secure concrete core samples from the North Tower. The investigation will take 8 months to a year. In the spirit of speculation, my premature assessment points to the lack of maintenance and urgency to rectify the issues purported within the 2018 PE report. I must add structures built in the 80's in Florida were poorly designed and constructed. Note Building codes in Florida changed after 1992 Hurricane Andrew. This is just my opinion, my two cents, I am not an engineer but that means nothing like everyone else on RU-vid. It's all amateur speculation. My heart goes out to the victims and their families. I knew two of the victims. Horrible situation.

I was on the market for a condo in NY state and had a realtor actually tell me that doing an inspection of a condo unit during escrow was a waste of money because “the HOA will handle any issues”. He even sent me an article from another realtor who was discouraging inspections. Needless to say, I didn’t feel comfortable with that and decided to work with another realtor who encouraged me to do my due diligence. After this collapse happened, I thought about that realtor and how many people he must’ve given that same terrible, potentially fatal advice to. Always, ALWAYS get an inspection and don’t rely on your HOA to protect you.

I will never look at a commercial garage the same way ever again!

Every experienced homeowner knows that when you see water on the floor, the real problem is not just water on the floor. Pipe leak, roof leak, whatever, it’s bad news. But until now, I never would have understood the ramifications of water leaks in a multi-story building or a garage like this. Thanks for educating us!

I worked all over Miami Beach in the early 90's and a very respected old timer told me that some contractors used ocean water to mix cement to save money. He said time would eventually tell which ones did. I thought of his comment immediately after I heard the news. He also told me they would have a water truck or hydrant connection on the street side but would pump ocean water in from the ocean side. Great videos btw.

This woman was very smart in checking out the garage and not just been influenced by the beauty of the building She must be glad she didn't buy there. She had to have been concerned with the condition of the garage seeing she filmed the ceiling

10:30 I know what that is, that is corrugated plastic sheeting. I have seen this in building garages before. The maintenance department was getting complaints from people about water dripping on their car. So they put those to "gutter" the dripping water away from the cars. Very very damaging image right there. That implies they knew water was dripping from above for some time.

I guess everyone is walking around their condo's garage now looking at the celling!!!

Man, look at that garage ceiling! No way would I be walking down there daily, much less parking my car under there! That concrete must have been the consistency of Jello before it failed.

Imagine how bad the condition was at time of the collapse. This video was taken a year ago!

Doesn’t seem like it’s been over a year now since this happened. Love and light to anyone who was affected by this disaster.

Did you notice that the base of all the columns, the bottom 6" or so look a little darker. It could be a waterline from a one time flood. Or maybe there is water inside the columns???

It is amazing how you can really see the size difference of the columns where the building survived versus where the building collapsed.

When you look at video in garage, look at bottom of pillars! You see water stains from concrete floor weeping up the columns. The fresh yellow paint shows they are covering the continued failure you garage area

Wow look how every single column is heavily saturated with water about 10” up the column, they were definitely absorbing moisture!

"Water is the Chief Architect of the Planet" - my personal observations from the Himalayas to my basement. Your videos set a standard of excellence in disaster reconstruction, and need to be sent to every victims' family's attorneys. Outrageous, wilful neglect.

I saw a interview with someone who lives there and they said they wondered why there was always water in garage and there had not been rain

If I owned a million dollar apartment and that was the garage I would be pissed...now it is just a tragedy.

When Jeff started talking about stalactites hanging from the ceiling I had to do a double take. I even thought over a fraction of a second "wtf, how could any building with stalactites stand... oh wait, I'm an idiot" My heart goes out to the victims, their families, and their friends. I hope justice for this gross negligence can somehow be served.

You can only imagine how corroded the rebar was inside the concrete, no amount of fresh paint will hide the problem going on in the structure.

I went another direction in my engineering education (aerospace) but have always been interested in architecture. You have covered this tragedy with outstanding information, drawings, video, etc. Your analysis and narration are top notch, IMO. In my less than qualified opinion, you nailed this. Great stuff. Your other analysis vid got me hooked on your level of information and detail. I subscribed to see what you do next. Take care and thank you for taking the time to put this together.

For her to take video of the ceiling, she must have had concerns back then. Amazing that she kept the video.

The yellow paint on every column looks darker at the bottom, which could be caused by moisture.

The potential purchaser of apartment # 611 and parking space #17. was very thoruough in doing that video and so graciously kept if to show others. Thank you lady.

Good for her for recording and keeping this footage so long! I have always took photos and videos of every place I've lived that is supposed to be maintained by others. I still have every single photo and video on an external hard drive. It's super important. You never know. I record, photograph, show the people in charge, and keep the photos/videos. This is something that everyone should get Into the habit of doing. People need to be held accountable and this is just one of the ways to hold them accountable.

Leon Wechsler Architect's Conclusion. If one looks at the columns in the garage, you can clearly see the lack of concrete tie beams spanning between the columns. Since this has no post tension cables, it is very easy to see why the deck collapsed. No tie beams, no extra support, the columns shear right thru the slab. In this case, look at the building that was still standing, the bottom of the second floor has a huge 24 inch or more concrete tie beam at the exterior perimeter. This tie beam supported the remaining building but the deck (pool deck) had no tie beams, therefore it collapsed via punch shear. This is a fundamental design mistake by the Structural Engineer of that time. The top of the columns should have at least a thickened slab to prevent this. There are numerous mistakes like this especially where the building collapsed. NO TIE BEAMS AT CRITICAL POINTS

Jeff, I worked as a guide in a cave back in the college days and I know it takes forever to form calcium stalactites this long (depending on calcium content in the water). The concrete stalactites grow much faster than in limestone caves, nevertheless, this is a huge red flag! The water had to be seeping through since the day one after the building was built. I would definitely NEVER buy a place in a building with this kind of problem!

This honestly looks like every parking garage along the gulf coast.

You can tell this building has been neglected for several decades and was just putting a ban-aid on things!

Those questionable things on the roof were corrugated plastic panels used to redirect the leaking water on the ceiling so it didn't drip onto tenants when they were getting into or out of their vehicles.

As a contractor years ago, I always said, "water is the enemy."

Jeff you have done such a great job on explaining this terrible tragedy.

22:33 Look at the upper left side of the concrete. The rebar has rusted and the concrete is cracked/separated. That column was near failure years ago. This was near parking spot 79 or under the front of the building that fell first. We know the pool deck was reported to be bad. The planters on the pool deck (near spot 79) were flagged as water intrusion points. I think the deck let go. The deck took out damaged columns near parking spot 79 and innated the collapse. The lack of beams linking columns likely helped the collapse spread. Lots of water issues seem to exist. Pipes were leaking, the pool deck leaks, the garage floods somehow at least in the past. Lots of maintenance issues added up over the decades. There were warning signs, but people were to busy to notice in time. Good days lead to good memories. Bad days lead to good lessons.

I wonder if there's a record of tenant claims of damage on their cars from stuff coming off the ceiling.

Great upload. I'm enjoying this discovery and I'm hoping that engineers looking at this collapse are as learned as you are and as resourceful!

I can see every damn condo owner now running around their building taking pics of everything 🤓

My heart is just broken for the families and Surfside community! Jeff, I just found your videos last night, and your educated guesses and commentary is so, so informative! Thanks for sharing your analyses, and using a colored mouse in this video since I couldn’t see what you were explaining in the last videos. God bless!

There is one area no one mentioned, the elevator pits. Those were geared elevators with the machine room located on the roof. At the bottom of the elevator shafts, there is a pit which contains the buffers and can vary in depth from 4 to 6 feet below the bottom floor of the parking garage. What I'm curious about, was there any water in those pits over the years and was it being pumped out? Reason being that those pits being below grade holding water can degrade the foundation and footings around those pits. The only way to know is finding out which elevator maintenance/repair company was contracted to service and maintain those elevators and if they have any reports indicating degradation of the elevator shafts and specifically those pits below grade. Anyway, it was just a thought coming from a former employee of a major elevator manufacturer.

10:53 the plastic sheeting is to stop the driver from getting wet when they enter or leave the car. this suggests it's a long term problem and when it rains alot of water comes through the floor above wetting these owners and thus the plastic sheeting

I noticed that on the Yellow portion of the columns (near the elevators) in the garage, you can see what looks like water marks. The water damage near the ramp could be due to water flowing down from street level. The sidewalk just outside of the ramp looks like it is over storm water piping. There could have been a small leak that gradually eroded the foundation on that side of the building.

The head maintenance guy from '95 to 2000 said the water would get so high, it would float cars. He ran pumps to get water out. He did this continually.

When you start seeing buckets to catch dripping water,its time to move.

Thank you. This is so good. Your explanations and musings about possibilities are so clear.

GREAT hearing from an engineer on this. Super informative!!!:)

Those rods look beyond rusted. It's like they have almost disolved inside the concrete.

"CP&R completed 90% of their work on the balconies. On Friday 09/18 they will be on site to complete the 4th, 3rd and 2nd floors. On Thursday 09/17 they will be on site more core samples of the slab. The front drive area concrete thickness is not matching up to the as build drawings the Association has on file. It is suspected that when the building was built, they sloped the top side of the structural slab giving us various thickness on the slab. Preliminary observations suggest no waterproofing was installed in the drive areas and the waterproofing for the pool deck is located just under the sand bed of the pavers." --- this is from the HOA meeting notes, Oct 10th, 2020

You broke this down like the Zapruder film! Thanks for taking the time to do this.

I will never walk through a parking garage the same way again. I have seen things about new construction that seemed odd. I won’t second guess myself again. Thank you for such great detailed break down of what you think happened and the evidence you used to come to that decision. I don’t believe that anyone could argue with what you have come up with. Congratulations.

At parking space 54 the concrete roof, including the rebar is hanging down. It was collapsing a year before the final complete collapse. That's why there is so much water on the floor there. The water was pouring through the break in the concrete roof above #54. They just patched it to stop the water pouring onto the vehicle.

By the looks of this it’s been coming for quite a while before all hell broke loose

Really informative analysis...It appears to me the garage ceiling between column 52 and 54 is pushing down and column 52 is slightly leaning maybe from the downward pressure. Looking at columns 52 and 54 side by side is where it looks like it is pushing to the left.

This makes me want to go examine all buildings. Well done, cheers.

It's eerie how that video from the summer of 2020 was taken... It gave the same feeling as watching videos from inside the twin towers before 9/11

This video gives me chills. Honestly this is like watching a horror movie. So many signs and the poor tenants without experience or knowledge did not know what was happening. I will be walking around my condo basement to look around tomorrow. Thank you for your detailed video, taking your time out to slowly explain and educate the public, very informative and I believe people need to be educated and be aware of these things

Most convincing observation analysis from an engineering point of view. Thank you.

It's interesting watching this after watching Building Integrity's forensic analysis. It's obvious you both have extremely different experience with buildings but it's nice to get a different insight considering how many engineers are going to be looking over this footage for the next few years.

In texas the condos on the beach don’t have parking under the condos. There’s a parking structure out near the roads coming in. But in Florida they cram all of it into too mich of a small spaces. It’s ridiculous.

Thanks for this.

Excellent video and explanation. It really identifies and brings to light what is where in the setup of the building and unfortunate collapse. Those ceiling patches that you pointed out looked like corrugated plastic or metal.

@5:00 "What is this?" Its an area that had cracked all the way through and had been leaking, it was repaired with a can of "flex seal" and never bothered with again. If you look back over photos and "on the ground" maintenance records you will see that this place was literally held together with "flex seal" rubber, no real efforts for maintaining or repairs where made to this structure.

Look at the "tide Marks" on the bottom of the yellow columns. They were definitely standing in water/soaking up.

Beautiful on the outside and rotten to the core on the inside

I love your videos and especially the music used in your videos. I'm binge watching the Surfside Condo Collapse videos. R.I.P to the victims 🙏 😢

Did a great job covering everything. I don't listen to any of the news people you showed. I would rather watch honest people like you cover it. Thank you. May they rest in peace

Excellent videos. Keep them coming. I know that garage like the back of my hand, as my family owned a condo there for almost 30 years (we sold in 2013). The cones were used by residents to block off their spots so that the valet wouldn't park a visitor's car in that spot while they were gone. The hurricane panels bolted to the ceiling were to deflect water away from the cars as those calcium-loaded drips would ruin car paint jobs. The car I had parked down there would be covered with a plastic tarp for that very reason.

I am not an architect, but I remember from chemistry class that water is called universal solvent - it contains extreme polar hydrogen bonds. Water will corrode most substances after time. Judging by all the water seen in garage, as well as cracks in concrete, apparently leaking and collecting for years, it's pretty clear the support columns must have corroded at base level over the years and finally gave way. Just my layman's view.

I was hired as a 'Maintenance carpenter' [whatever that means] to new fix newly built houses and carry out warranty services.. I had no idea what I was doing.. They even had me go out and check trusses and frames for faults. wtf? I lasted a year before I had to quit as I was putting not only myself, but others at risk. I was the bad guy in the end. This world cannot be trusted.

Thank you to the person who had the foresight to film and save this video, and I'm so glad you didn't move there.

Looks like the ceiling was water logged & sweating, softening up to cave in.

This definitely makes me think twice about cracks and puddles I see when going to the beach to stay in a condo for a week. 🧐😨

Thank you so much for these vids!

The mystery object on the ceiling is a "leak deflector" It conduits the leak water away from parked vehicles.

Such excellent work Jeff - I saw water damage at the base of the 105/106 column. Actually, you can see water damage/staining on all of the yellow columns at the base (unable to see it on the reds, but this could be because it's a darker color).

I'm so GLAD you are BREAKING all this down.

Again, very good assessment! 👍 Thank you!

I’m curious about something no one talks about. These apartments had a lot of ceramic tile and granite counters. That wouldn’t have been common 40 years ago. My question is…could the remodels of the individual apartments have added weight stress to the structure?

It’s amazing how much can be seen with just a passive Recording.

Everything about that garage would tell me this isn’t the place to be.

Good video, love the detail! I was surprised there were no use of I-Beams, just expecting rebar to hold up everything.

Thank you for all of your hard work.

Thanks Jeff - Excellent analysis and perspective. Looks like a lot of deferred maintenance over the years, and obvious design and build quality concerns. It's amazing how it can cause such a tragedy.

Jeff you should also do late night radio. You've got that smooooth voice.

so so sad thank u so much for showing us this this helped me and my dad figure out what we think happened lets keep every one of the famaliy members in our prayers

Thank you for lighting up your pointer it was hard to follow in other videos

5:30 One thing I noticed is the discoloration of the yellow paint at the bottom of the columns. It almost looks like water has seeped upwards from the bottom of the column. The tops of the discolorations are uneven. Could this be some sort of wicking effect? Am I imagining things?

Note about the orange cones in the parking garage: I used to certify service techs on how to safely back up their service vans into tight parking spaces, and one trick we used was to place a cone so that as the vehicle was backing and then barely bumped into the cone, that was the indicator to stop backing - saved all the guessing and dented bumpers.

Your analyses of this collapse are the most thorough I've seen.

Thanks for this!

The patches on the ceilings were probably catches, to keep little chunks of concrete from falling from the ceiling and scratching the cars.

Good analysis of these videos Jeff. I have worked in office buildings with far worse indicators of structural stress than what is shown here, which is very scary!

A number of the columns appear to have water marks at least 6" up into the yellow painted areas suggesting flooding of the garage floor. #106 also has water around it's base as well. This is consistent with some residents who reported the garage would flood to the extent their cars would float around in the garage.

@7:07 The garage security camera in the upper right hand side of the frame...Does that have any footage of the collapse? That would tell a lot!

You know you've done good work when people are flocking to your channel and subscribing! Keep up the great analyses!

The minute it collapsed and the complaints I heard directly after, had me come to the conclusion immediately that it was the water build-up and the pool leaking that caused the foundation underneath the concrete to erode. This was totally preventable and there is no doubt people should go to jail. As far as I'm concerned, this is murder.

as with roaches the spalling you see is nothing compared with the spalling you don't see.

Wasn’t sure what to expect when I first clicked on this link. You Far Exceeded my Expectations.👍