Investigators Surfside condo collapse began weeks before

Federal investigators have determined that the catastrophic 2021 collapse of the Champlain Towers South condominium in Surfside, Florida, was a slow-motion failure that began weeks before the building fell. The National Institute of Standards and Technology announced on Monday that the initial failure occurred in early June 2021 when two critical connections between garage columns and the building's pool deck gave way.

The 12-story oceanfront tower partially collapsed in the early morning hours of June 24, 2021, killing 98 people and injuring many others. The NIST investigation concluded that the failure of the two column connections caused cracks to grow and loads to redistribute across the pool deck over the subsequent three weeks. This transferred stress to adjacent structural elements that were not strong enough to bear the extra weight, leading to the progressive collapse of much of the building.

Investigators stated that the structure's "margins against failure were too narrow from the start." They cited two primary factors: severe deviations from the building codes and standards in place during its original design and construction in the late 1970s, and deviations in the...