Extensive Review of Champlain Towers Collapse Completed

said investigation associate lead Glenn Bell. “We were able to obtain over 600 pieces from the site that have provided valuable insight into Champlain Towers South.” 

Immediately following the collapse, the Miami-Dade Homicide Bureau began conducting a death investigation and maintained custody of all evidence. NIST was provided access to the evidence while it was in MDPD custody, and when the evidence custody and control transferred to NIST on Jan. 28, 2022, the MDPD maintained access to it.

A Safe, Secure Location for Evidence 
By the end of July 2021, all of the evidence was moved to secure locations, where it was carefully cataloged so that it could be tracked throughout the investigation. In March 2023, a portion of the evidence was moved to a second warehouse so that NIST, MDPD and their contractors could efficiently work with all the pieces as needed to support their investigations.

Finding additional space to securely and safely store the evidence took several months, as the facilities had to meet certain criteria for security, scale and accessibility. The process of preparing the materials for the move and then securing them in their new location took several weeks. This included having a board-certified industrial hygienist conduct air sampling for asbestos fibers to ensure the safety of those accessing the materials.

The additional space gave team members room to extract concrete cores and reinforcing steel from the evidence and allowed them to begin the next phase of evidence analysis. After completing this phase, the physical evidence was condensed, and organized by type, into a single warehouse. MDPD contractors managed the move, which was overseen by NIST staff.

In addition to the NIST and MDPD investigations, the civil litigants involved in a lawsuit related to the collapse hired their own experts to make observations, take measurements and conduct nondestructive testing. NIST provided them with access to the evidence in February and March 2022, before the civil litigation settlement was finalized in June 2022.

Analyzing the Evidence
The investigation team scanned the contents of each warehouse with an imaging technology called lidar after every milestone related to transporting or moving the evidence. Maps developed from these scans were shared with MDPD and its contractors so they could easily identify and track pieces, and NIST also used the scans to remotely inspect the evidence, and to plan its work. NIST