A Delicate Decision: When to End Search for Any Florida Condo Survivors

The death toll rose to 22 after four more victims were found, including the 7-year-old daughter of a firefighter. No survivors have been discovered since the day the condo collapsed.

SURFSIDE, Fla. — Even as officials and rescue workers pledge hope, however slim, that life could be found within the voids of the rubble of the Champlain Towers South condominium complex near Miami, the language around the tragedy has subtly begun to shift into the past tense. Mourners paying their respects at makeshift memorials near the cordoned-off site have begun to speak of the lost, while local and federal officials are publicly asking for, as Gov. Ron DeSantis said this week, a little bit of luck, prayers and some miracles. “They know that the chances are, as each day goes by, diminished slightly,” President Biden said of the families of the missing after meeting with them on Thursday.