Indiana search-and-rescue team called to Florida condo collapse
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — After one member of Indiana Task Force 1 was called to the Florida condo collapse earlier this week, the entire Hoosier rescue team was deployed Wednesday night to go there.
Commander Tom Neal said Wednesday afternoon that Indiana Task Force 1 will deploy as an urban search-and-rescue task force for the Champlain Towers collapse in Surfside, Florida. Neal’s announcement came through an email from a spokeswoman for the Indianapolis Fire Department.
The search for survivors stretched into a seventh day Wednesday, with more than 900 workers from 50 federal, state and local agencies working on the effort. At least 18 people are confirmed dead and more than 140 still unaccounted for.
On top of the manpower being sent to Miami, Indiana Task Force 1 will also be sending semis full of heavy machinery to help move rubble and debris as well as search equipment that can detect motion or sounds deep within the layers of destruction. Four police dogs that can smell human scent through feet of concrete also will join the Indiana teams.
Neal saw the video of the devastation that his crews would be responding to and was taken back to his time on Ground Zero responding to the 9/11 tragedy in New York City. He says he got a pit in his stomach thinking about what was to come. “I think everyone still has hope and we pray that we will find someone alive but the other side of it is the human tragedy,” Neal said. “We train for it and we hope the day never comes but it is real and when you see the video of that collapse I mean you can only hope and pray.”
A member of Indiana Task Force 1 is already among those searching the rubble for survivors; Scott Nacheman is a structural engineer. He was deployed Sunday to work with local first responders looking for any survivors.
Nacheman said Wednesday in an interview with News 8, “We are still operating under rescue guidelines. We are pushing forward, you know, this end goal of finding people out there. There have been stories anecdotally we have been hearing, but, at this point, it does not change our operation. We are pushing forward. We are finding voids, and the hope is that we are going to find, eventually find the occupants of that building.”
Nacheman says in terms of intensity, urgency and dedication of first responders, the operation is similar to what he saw following the collapse of the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001.
Eighty personnel of Indiana Task Force 1 will leave at 8 p.m. Wednesday for Miami. The team will be taking a full cache of equipment for operations.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.