That miracles still happen once in a while. I tried to comfort them, to tell them that our Jewish history tells us to never lose hope. “I saw the relatives in shul, and it was heartbreaking,” Shai told the Forward. "Maybe there's a confined space that somebody left, and somebody is alive in there," he said.Members of the Israel rescuers delegation gather upon their arrival in the area near the partially collapsed 12-story Champlain Towers South condo building in the city of Surfside, Florida, on June 27, 2021. It's natural," Vach said.īut the team has not given up hope, he stresses, saying that every day it finds new spaces and channels within the layers of debris. "I would not say there are no chances."Īt the end of their 12-hour shifts, members of the Israeli team meet to talk and process their laborious task. Vach said his conversations with families have been difficult, and his team was committed to being transparent with them as the possibility of finding victims alive grows slimmer. On the beach, a few hundred meters from the pile of twisted metal and concrete where the tower once stood intact, the word "HOPE" is etched in enormous letters in the sand. At a makeshift memorial near the site, someone left a flower pot with orchids and a message inscribed: "Estelle, stay strong, come home." Once they know where they are on the site, the crews must penetrate meters of concrete in an effort to reach the bedrooms and search for possible cavities where survivors may have found a measure of protection, Vach said.Īuthorities have said that they could still find survivors as their search stretched into its sixth day, with 11 people confirmed dead. "Our purpose is to get the first responder to understand, where exactly is he digging?" he said. Vach's team has consulted with the families to get the best idea of where their relatives might have been within their apartments at the time the building collapsed.
ISRAEL SEARCH AND RESCUE TEAM PATCH
"We are looking for the bedrooms because people were sleeping," said Vach, wearing a religious skullcap and army green uniform with an Israeli flag patch on one sleeve.
ISRAEL SEARCH AND RESCUE TEAM HOW TO
The team then carefully replicated the manner in which the tower appeared to have collapsed, aiming to understand how to excavate the site with the highest probability of finding survivors. To prepare for the operation, Vach said the teams studied the structure of Champlain Tower South while still in Israel and built 3D models of the 40-year-old high-rise.
Several families had expressed hope the Israeli team, renowned for skills honed during rescue operations at buildings damaged by warfare, would join the frantic search for survivors. More than two dozen of the 150 unaccounted for were Jewish and had links to Israel, according to an Israeli official. Joining forces with the hundreds of American first responders and a team of Mexican rescuers, the Israelis have spent every waking hour either sifting through the four-story pile of debris or meeting with the families of the missing, with two- to three-hour breaks for sleep, Vach said. "It's one of the most difficult and complicated situations that I've ever seen," Vach, who has commanded his unit for four years, said on Tuesday.