Some 30 Latin Americans Missing In Miami Building Collapse

News Americas, MIAMI, FL, Tues. June 29, 2021: At least 30 Latin Americans are missing following thecollapse of the Champlain Towers South apartment building on June 24, 2021.

At least 9 are from Argentina while another 6 are from Colombia, Venezuela and Paraguay. Three are from Uruguay and at least one from Chile.

Nine Argentines were missing as of Thursday afternoon, the country’s consulate in Miami said on Twitter. Among those missing are Argentines Andrés Galfrascoli, 45, his partner Fabián Nuñez, 55, and their daughter, Sofía Galfrascoli Núñez, 6, are among the missing, according to a friend. The three were on vacation in Florida, staying at the condo of a friend, Nicolás Fernández.

“At the moment we are handling information from six Venezuelans not located in the collapse of the building in Surfside,” Brian Fincheltub, Venezuela’s consular affairs director, tweeted.

Six Colombian citizens are unaccounted for following the collapse, Colombian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Camila Mugno told CNN. Records indicated that the six had been staying there, the foreign ministry’s office said.

The six Colombian citizens include a family of three from Medellin, and other travelers, Mugno told CNN.

Six Paraguayans in all are unaccounted for, the ministry tweeted. The sister and brother-in-law of Paraguay’s first lady, Silvana López Moreira, were staying with their three children at the building, and Paraguay’s ministry of external relations has not been able to locate the family, the ministry told CNN. That family — including Sophia López Moreira and her husband Luis Pettengill — was in the U.S. to receive COVID-19 vaccinations, Paraguay’s foreign minister said.

Three Uruguayan citizens are among the missing, according to the Uruguay consulate in Miami. “The relatives are very concerned, of course, because they have not been able to contact them since they have knowledge of this tragic collapse,” Consul General Eduardo Bouzout has been quoted as saying.

So far, Chilean authorities have not reported missing nationals after the collapse but the first cousin of former Chilean President and UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet’s father is among those missing, his daughter told CNN Chile.