MIAMI — The city of Miami Beach is ordering residents of a 164-unit condo tower to evacuate the building after engineers found significant damage to a critical structural beam in the parking garage.
Miami Beach spokesperson Melissa Berthier said Thursday afternoon that the city planned to post an unsafe structure notice and order residents of the Port Royale Condominium at 6969 Collins Ave., to vacate immediately.
Shortly before 5 p.m. Eastern time, the condo board sent residents a mandatory notice to vacate the premises by 7 p.m.
In a letter Thursday to Miami Beach building official Ana Salgueiro, engineers from Hialeah-based Inspection Engineers Inc. said they told the condo board that everyone in the building should “evacuate immediately.”
The damaged concrete beam “might support the entire building structure,” the engineers noted, though they said that conclusion was based on visual observations and that they do not have original calculations or designs.
The city’s evacuation order came just hours after city inspectors issued a violation notice at the building but refrained from ordering an evacuation. Berthier said the engineering firm had informed the city of its concerns via phone but had not yet filed a formal report. The city ordered a report to be filed within 24 hours.
The condo board had sent an email to unit owners and renters Wednesday evening, informing them that the engineers were “recommending vacating the premises” but not ordering anyone to leave.
In a Wednesday letter to the Port Royale Condominium board, Inspection Engineers Inc. said it had observed “continuous deterioration” of a “main beam” that supports the building’s structure in the third-level mezzanine of the parking garage. The firm recommended shoring — a method of reinforcing areas that need repair — to ensure the safety of the 14-story beachfront condo built in 1971.
“Please take this advice seriously,” the engineering firm’s letter said. “We are not trying to scare anybody, but as your engineer of record we must take all precautions seriously.”
The firm said it is now working with a shoring expert to provide calculations and design to obtain a permit from the city. The new shoring should be installed within 10 days, engineers Arshad Viqar and Robert Guzman said, after which engineers will inspect the building “to allow the unit owners to return to their apartments.”
Representatives for the condo association and the engineering firm did not immediately respond to requests for comment Thursday.
Engineers noticed the damage while they were overseeing repairs to the garage that began about a month ago, according to the Inspection Engineers Inc., report. The firm said it found approximately half an inch of “deflection,” or movement, from the original position of one of the main beams that had already been identified as needing repairs. In addition, an existing crack that was set to be repaired had expanded.
The evacuation follows an earlier safety scare at the building last July, just weeks after the catastrophic Champlain Towers South collapse in Surfside.
As local building departments across South Florida were scrambling to evaluate the structural integrity of large buildings — and especially beachfront condos — the Port Royale received an unsafe structure notice from the city of Miami Beach that pointed to structural deterioration and concrete spalling, including in the garage.
Shoring was installed and residents were ultimately allowed to stay.
Now, the repairs needed on the garage’s main beam are “much more complicated than originally expected,” Inspection Engineers said in a Tuesday letter to the condo board. The shoring needed to secure it will be “very expensive,” the letter said.
Records show the Port Royale building went through a lengthy 40-year recertification process that was completed in 2014. It is now undergoing repairs as part of its 50-year recertification as required by Miami-Dade County.
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