Instead, it collapsed Thursday, months before it was to open, crushing cars below, killing at least six people and leaving investigators with the difficult task of trying to figure out why it happened and who might be held responsible.
“If anybody’s done anything wrong, we’ll hold them accountable,” Florida Gov. Rick Scott said.
Emergency crews on Friday shifted their focus from a rescue mission to the “very slow process” of digging through the rubble for more victims and preserving evidence around the unstable bridge remnants, Miami-Dade police spokesman Alvaro Zabaleta said.
One of the things crews hope to do is raise the bridge off vehicles using a large inflatable airbag, a source close to the bridge collapse investigation told CNN.
Recovery workers expect to find more bodies as debris is removed, Miami-Dade police Director Juan Perez said Friday. Of the six people who died, five bodies still were under the bridge wreckage Friday morning, Zabaleta said.
The first to be identified was an 18-year-old FIU student. The father of Alexa Duran told el Nuevo Herald newspaper in Miami that his daughter had died. “My little girl was trapped in the car and couldn’t get out,” Orlando Duran said.
Duran was driving an SUV under the bridge. A male passenger was able to get out and is at a hospital with neck and leg injuries.
Key developments
• The names of those who died were not immediately released as authorities worked to contact family members, Zabaleta said.
• At least nine people were taken to hospitals, authorities said.
• The university’s president, Mark Rosenberg, said FIU followed required processes during the bridge’s construction and all contractors were certified by the state.
Witness: ‘Sounded like the world was ending’
Witnesses described hearing a loud boom Thursday and moments later, finding victims, including construction workers, strewn throughout the wreckage. Other people were trapped in cars, they said.
Giovanni Hernandez said it “sounded like a bomb, like multiple bombs in one.”
Sweetwater police Sgt. Jenna Mendez was stopped at a red light one intersection away when she saw the bridge crumple. At first, she thought, “Why would they have brought the bridge down during the day?”
Mendez drove forward, saw crushed vehicles and realized “this was not on purpose, this was a catastrophe,” she told CNN.
Two men had broken bones, and two others were unconscious — one who wasn’t breathing and the other with a major cut to this head. Mendez started chest compressions on the one who wasn’t breathing, she said.
“I started yelling to civilians in the crowd, ‘Please get me doctors. … I need help up here.’ A doctor jumped up, and she started helping,” Mendez said.
Doctors and medical students ran to the scene from a nearby building and started treating victims, said Isabella Carrasco, a student at the University of Miami who had passed under the bridge in a car just before the collapse.
Carrasco saw at least five cars crushed beneath the bridge, she said.
“Someone on the side of the road had asked a police officer if she had heard any response from the people inside the car,” Carrasco said, “and she shook her head and said no.”
Kendall Regional Medical Center received 10 patients, including two in critical condition, said Dr. Mark G. McKenney, the trauma medical director.
Bridge designed to withstand a Category 5 hurricane
“It is exactly the opposite of what we had intended, and we want to express our deepest condolences to the family and loved ones of those who have been affected,” Rosenberg, the university’s president, said in a video.
“The bridge was about collaboration, about neighborliness, about doing the right thing,” he said. “But today, we’re sad. And all we can do is promise a very thorough investigation, to getting to the bottom of this and mourn those who we have lost.”
Construction firms vow to investigate
Companies involved in the bridge construction expressed sympathy for the victims and pledged to find out what happened.
MCM, a construction firm building the bridge, said in a statement it would “conduct a full investigation to determine exactly what went wrong and will cooperate with investigators on scene in every way.”
The bridge’s designer, FIGG Bridge Engineers, stated: “We will fully cooperate with every appropriate authority in reviewing what happened and why. In our 40-year history, nothing like this has ever happened before.”
Bolton Perez and Associates, a third company involved in the construction of the bridge, would not immediately comment.
The National Transportation Safety Board will lead the federal inquiry, and a team of investigators arrived Thursday night.
CORRECTION: This story has been updated to correct the number of people killed.
CNN’s Dakin Andone, Rosa Flores, Kevin Conlon, Mary Moloney, Deanna Hackney, Amanda Watts, Justin Lear, Rene Marsh, Jamiel Lynch, Chris Boyette and Keith Allen contributed to this report.
Source : Nbcnewyork