FORT LAUDERDALE, Florida (AP) — At the Seaview Hotel in Surfside, a sprawling and once impersonal ballroom has become a haven — a shared place of hope and sorrow where grieving families wait desperately for news of relatives trapped inside each other. comfort each other during Collapsed condo building.
Twice a day, every day, for more than two weeks, the kin of 79 people who died and 61 are still missing, lurking in spacious rooms, an immeasurable disaster imposed a new daily routine on them is.
Many members of this small community engulfed in tragedy have started arriving early and staying late for meetings. They sit and talk in small groups. They hug each other, bringing water and tissue to each other. On days when information is scarce, rescue teams, including people from other countries, circulate through the room, providing more detailed information.
Officials announced Wednesday they were changing their mission from rescue to recovery, but have no plans to stop private briefings for families, said Maggie Castro, a Miami-Dade firefighter and paramedic who keeps relatives updated. and makes its own connections with them.
“Obviously it’s a huge tragedy, but if I can find any kind of bright spot in this whole thing, it’s to be with these families, watching their feelings come and go… There is also watching the medium evolve and then watching them bond,” Castro said.
Soria Cohen’s husband Brad Cohen is still missing. Her brother-in-law Gary Cohen was reunited on Thursday, and her two children are begging rescuers to find a similar grid line to finding their father.
“The community loves it so much,” she said, recalling how volunteers wrapped her in a blanket, brought her food and coffee in the early days after the fall, and “surrounded me with so much emotional support.”
He still has the blanket, he said in a text on Friday.
Workers walk past the collapsed and later demolished Champlain Towers South condominium building in Surfside, Florida, Tuesday, July 6, 2021 (AP Photo/Lynn Sladki)
Rachel Spiegel, whose mother, Judy, is still missing, said she, her father and brother have also made connections with other families inside the room, but she refrained from calling it comfort.
“I don’t know if I would define it as comfort because we still don’t know where my mom is. She’s still missing.”
Surfside Mayor Charles Burkett, left, talks with Rachel Spiegel, who is looking for information about the Champlain Towers South Condo Building in the Surfside area of Miami, June 26, 2021. (AP Photo/Lynn Sladkie)
Although sobs could be heard in the background on Wednesday night as officials announced they would move from rescue to recovery, largely dashing any hopes of survivors, some families said they would not wait until then. Will not feel isolated until they have the last word on loved ones.
“It’s hard to digest,” Spiegel said in a phone call. “Many said they feel the change. For us, we just want to find our mom and be reunited with her. We’re still hoping for the best. Once we find her and If we get back together with him, we’re going to make this change.”
The Cohen family said it was painful not to have any updates on Brad Cohen.
“I don’t think the terminology of rescue versus recovery matters. It’s semantics,” Soria Cohen said. “They’ll find people in whatever state they’re in, however it’s called.”
Other families told rescue workers that they felt a sense of finality when activists began searching for victims instead of survivors.
“I think there’s a kind of shift toward acceptance, but obviously with it comes some sadness,” Castro said, adding that the families are physically and emotionally exhausted. “It’s a very, very emotional roller coaster that they’re going through, just trying to stay positive and hold on waiting,” she said.
Rescuers carry a stretcher full of recovered remains in a van at the site of the collapsed Champlain Towers South condo building on July 5, 2021 in Surfside, Florida. (Lynn Sladki/AP)
The family briefings are surrounded by heavy security, with various checkpoints to protect their privacy.
Organizations set up across a row of in-room tables offer everything from free international phone calls and consultations to clothing and accommodations. Many snowbirds are offering their surfside homes to displaced survivors, said Rabbi Yaakov Sachs, a family friend who flew in from New York to comfort the Cohens. The owner of the 16-unit building made it rent-free for Surfside’s survivors for the month of July.
Large plates of food and drink are served day and night, including Glatt kosher food, all donated by community members to ease the pain.
Meanwhile, Support Surfside has pledged $2 million and $2 million for victims, and GoFundMe has raised $1.7 million separately for various families.
The nearby synagogue has been converted into a spacious clothing and dry goods facility for families to pick up items while they wait.
Sachs described the ballroom as being painfully quiet at times.
“When families were either sitting or standing together, they waited for the news, for the most part, quietly and painfully,” he said. “While some families would welcome any news at that stage, others would welcome only good news.”