Surf disaster raises fears of San Francisco building sinking

San Francisco’s stately Millennium Tower, with soaring panoramic views and world-class amenities, opened to great fanfare in 2009.

© Justin Sullivan / Getty Images North America / Getty Images SAN FRANCISCO, CA – AUGUST 11: A view of the Millennium Tower on August 11, 2016 in San Francisco, California. A $500 million lawsuit was filed against the building’s owner, Millennium Tower owner, Millennium Partners, and joint powers authority Transbay after it was revealed that the building had sunk 16 inches into the ground and leaned two inches to the northwest. The 58-story, 419-storey building was completed in 2009 (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Twelve years later, “Your City Within a City,” a 58-story building with more than 400 multimillion-dollar units in San Francisco’s tallest apartment building is still being promoted.

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Frank Jernigan, a former resident of the Millennium, recalls that it “has been described as one of the 10 most luxurious buildings in the world”.

But, since its opening, the massive blue-gray 18-inch tower has sunk into the soft downtown soil on which it was built—and tilted, according to current Millennium Architect, Ronald Hamburger.

Now, amid reports that the fatal collapse of the South Champlain Towers more than 3,000 miles away in Surfside, Florida, began in the building’s lower reaches, questions are being raised about the structural integrity of the Bay Area tower.

“When a high rise collapses and you had a situation in San Francisco — we had a high rise that was sinking and tilting — it affects your peace of mind,” said attorney Niall McCarthy. About 100 Millennium Tower residents who reached a compromise settlement in 2020 with developers and others have appeared in a lawsuit alleging their property value plummeted with news of the sinking.

Millennium Architect: Surfside comparisons ‘reckless and premature’

Hamburger, who has monitored the Millennium Tower settlements and assessed their impact on the structure since 2014, told CNN in a statement that the building is designed to withstand earthquakes, remains safe and is not at risk of collapse.

“The collapse of the apartment building in Surfside … was tragic, but it is too early to speculate what caused that disaster – and any potential comparisons to the Millennium Tower would be reckless and premature,” Hamburger said.

“The Millennium Tower is built to strict earthquake-resistant standards and is a more stringent form of construction than typical Florida buildings, which do not need to be designed to withstand earthquakes,” he added. “I can say with confidence that the settlements witnessed by the Millennium Tower did not endanger its stability and safety.”

The $100 million overhaul, scheduled for completion next year, involves installing bedrock piles in downtown San Francisco below the building, according to Millennium spokesperson Doug Elmitz. He said the piles would then be attached to the existing foundation.

The retrofit, announced in October after years of lawsuits, hearings and accusations, will finally cement the building’s foundation. The original foundation was built in deep sands and experts determined that nearby projects and a process known as dewatering had weakened the soil under the sinking tower.

“The structural modernization currently underway at the tower is aimed at preventing further stability, and restoring some of the building’s tilt, rather than repairing damage or providing reinforcements,” Hamburger said in the statement. “The building is still safe and is not in danger of collapsing.”

Video: Surfside apartment demolition order (CNN)

Surfside apartment demolition order

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The collapse of the side of the waves may have started in the lower reaches of the building

In Florida, at least 24 people were killed and dozens are still missing after the apartment building partially collapsed last Thursday. Search and rescue teams worked frantically to locate the missing residents until efforts were paused on Thursday amid structural concerns about parts of the building still standing. Those efforts resumed Thursday evening.

Several engineers told CNN that the video of the collapse indicated that the collapse began near the foundation of the structure, and a 2018 survey prepared before the building was approved 40 years ago cited problems in the pool area and garage underneath.

Resident Sarah Nir, who was in her ground-floor apartment in South Champlain Towers with her two children on the night of the collapse, said she heard loud knocks followed by a bang. She said she ran toward the sound and watched the building’s underground garage collapse.

The cause of the collapse is still unknown.

Surviving members of the Champlain Towers South Association released a statement Friday saying, “We know answers will take time as part of a comprehensive investigation and we will continue to work with city, state, local and federal officials on the rescue effort and to understand the causes of this tragedy.”

“It was a really nice place to live”

“These guys were lying comfortably in bed at night with absolutely no warning,” Jernigan, a former millennial, said of the Surfside disaster. “It’s awful that families are passing by now. And our hearts just explode.”

Jernigan, a retired software engineer, and Andrew Falk, a retired physician, paid more than $4 million in 2011 for their 50th floor apartment of the Millennium.

Years later, Jernigan and Faulk learned that the altitude was not only sinking but also tilting. In 2016, they recorded a massively viewed online video titled “Marble Roll in the Millennium Tower”.

“It was the first time we did it,” Jernigan said of the experience. “He’s got the marble out and I’m going to roll it up and see what it does.”

In the video, which was meant to show the infamous tilt, marbles were being rolled onto a hardwood floor but then changed direction.

Jernigan, who filmed the video, said of the ball’s trajectory “rolling over 10 feet.” “It slows down to a stop and then turns around and starts to back off and increases speed as it overtakes it.”

Fulk enters “in the direction in which the building is tilted”. “So, it was like, ‘Oh my God. “

In 2017, CBS’ “60 Minutes” dubbed a Millennium segment “San Francisco’s Leaning Tower,” which showed alarming stress gauges and cracks in the building’s foundation.

Jernigan and Faulk sold two millennia units in 2017 for what the former software engineer called “quake selling prices.”

“It was a really nice place to live, of course we didn’t know it when we were moving, but there were also great people who lived there,” Jernigan said.

Amenities in the building included a barrel-shaped wine cabinet, a private movie theater, a sprawling outdoor terrace with a marble fireplace, and a waterfall overlooking the Olympic-sized indoor pool.

Of course, Jernigan and Faulk won’t be around once with their friends and neighbors to complete the Millennium Repair in late 2022. They’ve moved to another apartment complex.

“We did what we had to do to have peace of mind,” Jernigan said.

“We got our bags… put everything in them… and left,” Falk added.

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