SURFSIDE, Fla. — Demolition crews set off explosives just after 10 p.m. Sunday to bring down the precarious remnants of a South Florida condo building that partially collapsed June 24.
Watch the footage provided by USA Today below:
Miami-Dade Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said in a news conference earlier Sunday evening that the controlled demolition, known as an “energetic felling,” would allow rescue teams to resume searching the rubble without fear of secondary collapse. The method is also designed to bring the tower straight down, minimizing disruption to surrounding structures.
Levine Cava confirmed to CNN that the tower’s remnants fell just after 10:30 p.m. Sunday.
Demolition crews just set off explosives to bring down rest of the collapsed condo in Surfside, Florida pic.twitter.com/rahiv2lMnE
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A Miami-Dade fire official told The Associated Press that search teams could resume their work between 15 and 60 minutes after the demolition.
To date, search crews have recovered the remains of 24 people, and 121 remain unaccounted for.
Sunday’s demolition was ordered as Tropical Storm Elsa bears down on Cuba and sets its sights on Florida’s western coast for a potential second landfall sometime Tuesday or Wednesday.
According to the AP, rescuers are hopeful the demolition will allow search crews access to the collapsed tower’s garage area that has been inaccessible.
Rescuers will await the “all-clear” after the demolition and then immediately dive back into the task of trying to locate any survivors buried under the rubble, County Mayor Daniella Levine Cava said. Officials had previously said that the search could resume from 15 minutes to an hour after the detonation.
“We are standing by. We are ready to go in, no matter the time of night,” Levine Cava told a news conference Sunday night.
-- The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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