The bodies of six more victims have been found in the rubble of a collapsed residential tower in Florida, raising the death toll to 18, local officials said on Wednesday.
Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said 147 people were missing and feared trapped in the ruins of the Champlain Towers South condo.
She said two of the 18 confirmed fatalities were children aged 10 and 4.
"The loss of children is too great to bear," Ms Levine Cava said. "Our community, our nation and the world all are mourning with these families who have lost loved ones."
While the official death toll is now 18 after most of the building in the Miami-area town of Surfside suddenly collapsed about a week ago, hopes are dwindling that the hundreds of rescuers combing the oceanfront site will find anyone alive.
The updated death toll means 147 people are still missing.
Officials have said they still hold hope of finding survivors.
Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett said he had promised families that rescue crews were "not leaving anyone behind" as teams dig deeper into the rubble.
"We've not gotten to the bottom. We don't know what's down there," Mr Burkett said. "We're not going to guess.
"We're not going to make a life-or-death decision to arbitrarily stop searching for people who may be alive in that rubble."
He said that every day the mound of wreckage was visibly shrinking, indicating progress.
Two teams of dogs were helping to scour the pile – one trained to sniff out survivors, and the other to detect bodies.
Col Golan Vach, head of an Israeli military unit that specialises in search and rescue, told CNN his team found "tunnels" under the debris and that the team had crawled through them looking for survivors.
In one case, the space was between balconies of apartments that pancaked when part of the building collapsed, he said.
“Between them remained a big space of air,” Col Vach said. “We crawled in those tunnels. We called people and unfortunately we didn't find anything.”
He said hopes of finding survivors so long after the early morning collapse were “very, very minor. We must be realistic".
The cave-in of the 12-storey Champlain Towers South building has sparked a search and rescue effort involving engineers and specialists from across the US and as far afield as Mexico and Israel.
US President Joe Biden will visit the site on Thursday with his wife Dr Jill Biden to ensure state and local officials have everything they need, and to meet families of the victims.
Residents in the part of Champlain Towers South that remained intact reported being awakened around 1.30am last Thursday by what sounded like cracks of thunder that shook their rooms.
“It was like an earthquake,” Janette Aguero, who escaped from the tower's 11th floor with her family, told AFP.
Rescuers who arrived in the moments after the tower came down helped remove dozens of residents and pulled one teenage boy alive from the rubble.
But since then, no other survivors have been found, despite huge numbers of rescuers combing the debris with the help of sniffer dogs and cranes.
“There are currently 210 people working on the site. The urban search and rescue team has been augmented by teams from all over the state and all over the world,” Miami-Dade County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said on Tuesday.
Experts are looking at possible pre-existing critical flaws in the structure of the apartment tower that may have caused the collapse.
An October 2018 report released by city officials last Friday revealed fears of “major structural damage” in the complex, including the concrete slab under the pool deck and the columns and beams in the parking garage.
In a letter to residents in April, Jean Wodnicki, the chair of the condo association, described “accelerating” damage to the building since then.
Repairs had been set to begin soon on the 40-year-old building — but they did not come soon enough.
-
A couple waits for news of their loved ones from a condominium that collapsed in Surfside, Florida. Marta Lavandier / AP Photo -
An aerial view of the search and rescue personnel working on site after the partial collapse of the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, north of Miami Beach. Chandan Khanna / AFP -
View of a 12-story condominium building that partially collapsed in Surfside, Florida. Cristobal Herrera-Ulashkevich / EPA -
This aerial shot shows search and rescue personnel working on site after the partial collapse of the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, north of Miami Beach. Chandan Khanna / AFP -
A Miami-Dade Fire Rescue team sprays water onto the rubble as rescue efforts continue where a wing of a 12-story beachfront condo building collapsed, late on Thursday, June 24, 2021, in Miami. Gerald Herbert / AP Photo -
Lightning strikes above the Champlain Towers South as Search and Rescue personnel work after the partial collapse of the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, north of Miami Beach. Chandan Khanna / AFP -
Search and Rescue personnel hold a stretcher after recovering a body from the rubble after the partial collapse of the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, north of Miami Beach, on June 24, 2021. Chandan Khanna / AFP -
A building that partially collapsed is seen in Surfside, near Miami Beach, Florida. Octavio Jones / Reuters -
Emergency crew members search for missing residents in a partially collapsed building in Surfside, near Miami Beach, Florida. Octavio Jones / Reuters -
Emergency crews respond to a partially collapsed residential building in Surfside, near Miami Beach Florida. Marco Bello / Reuters -
A couple embrace as they wait for news of survivors from a condominium that collapsed in Surfside, Florida. Marta Lavandier / AP Photo -
A woman cries while waiting for news of survivors from a condominium that partially collapsed in Surfside, Florida. Marta Lavandier / AP Photo -
This aerial view shows search and rescue personnel working on site after the partial collapse of the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, north of Miami Beach. Chandan Khanna / AFP
