(CNN Spanish) -
A pool contractor who served the pool at Champlain Towers 36 hours before its collapse told the
Miami Herald
that when he first entered the building, the pool area and the upper lobby looked good But when he entered the basement garage under the pool deck, he claims he saw a lot of standing water and claims to have found cracks in the concrete of the pool equipment room, according to
Miami Herald
reporter
Sarah Blaskey.
"[He] thought, 'wow, why haven't they maintained this building better?'
And he took a picture of that concrete to send to his boss, because he was there to do some cosmetic stuff in the pool, but he thought, 'wow, this is going to be a bigger job,' he took a picture, sent it to his boss, and that's the photo (…) we posted just a couple of hours ago, ”Blaskey told CNN.
Minute by minute: partial collapse of a building in Miami;
the death toll increases
According to Blaskey, experts have told the
Miami Herald
that what the contractor's photos show may be even worse than what was described in the 2018 report. the phrase that was used in that 2018 report, if by that the engineer meant something like what we saw in this image today, then certainly that kind of damage under the pool cover, which is closer to the north or north side of the building, which could have contributed to the collapse. The fear is that maybe that's what's going on, ”Blaskey said.
However, Blaskey noted an important caveat, noting that the photos were reportedly taken in the equipment room on the south side of the basement structure, rather than the north side, where the structure collapsed. “The building collapsed on the north side and therefore the part where you see these photos is not immediately in the collapse. It is not clear whether they contributed to the collapse. We understand that they could have, the way the building is formed. However, they did not collapse in the same way. Still, experts tell us that if other parts of the building or other parts of the structure looked the same as those photos in the pool room, then certainly that could have contributed to that collapse, "Blaskey told CNN. .
Blaskey also pointed out that pool chemicals can worsen the degradation of concrete and rebar, making it possible for damage under the pool deck to be isolated and the other rebar might not be as bad. serious.
CNN has independently communicated about the report and a spokesperson for the Champlain Towers South condo association declined to comment.
Building collapse