The legacy that changed the underwriting room
The broader significance of the Surfside anniversary for the industry lies not in Damac’s struggles alone, but in the systemic changes the collapse set in motion. The event also took on fresh urgency on Monday, when NIST released its long-awaited technical findings. Federal investigators concluded that the collapse began several weeks before June 24, 2021, when two connections between garage columns and the pool deck started to fail. The original structure, investigators found, had been built to less than half the code-required strength in some locations — a deficiency present from the day the building opened in 1981. NIST’s full written report, including code and practice recommendations, is still being drafted.
