A mother and teenage daughter who survived the collapse of the Champlain Towers South in Surfside, Florida in June have opened up about the harrowing experience, revealing how they made an attempt to run after the building shook but ultimately fell five stories and sustained terrible injuries.
Angela Gonzalez, 45, and her daughter Deven, 16, were in their apartment on the ninth floor of the building, where they’d lived for 15 years.
But their last night there was a traumatic one, as they told Today: At 1:30 in the morning, Angela screamed to run and grabbed Deven, realizing something was horribly wrong.
While the pair managed to survive the destruction, though, Angela’s husband and Deven’s father, Edgar Gonzalez, did not, and now they’re recovering while mourning his loss.
Telling their story: Survivors of the Champlain Towers collapse in Florida are sharing details of their ordeal
Longtime residents: The Gonzalez family lived on the ninth floor of the building for 15 years
Opening up: Deven (left) and Angela (right) have spoken candidly about the harrowing experience in a new interview with Today
On June 24 at 1:30 a.m., Angela, Edgar, and Deven were all watching a movie together in the master bedroom.
Deven had drifted off to sleep, and her older sister, Tayler, wasn’t there.
That’s when Angela felt a tremor in the building, which seemed similar to an earthquake. She also heard a sound that she thought was thunder — but quickly realized something was about to happen and leaped into action.
‘I remember Mom yelling, “Run!” and dragging me out of bed,’ Deven said. ‘I was half asleep. I thought I was dreaming at that point.’
‘We made it maybe a couple steps out of our bedroom, and then the floor just started to cave,’ Angela recalled. ‘It was like two little falls. Falling as the floor caved in, and then I just grabbed her for the remainder of the fall.’
They fell down five stories, landing in the debris of the collapsed building.
In an instant: Angela felt the building shake that night and tried to run with her family
Terrifying: She and her daughter Deven survived, while her older daughter Tayler was not at home
Painful: Deven sows off the scar left behind when the femur in her left leg was crushed
Scary stuff: A piece of metal had also pierced the teenager’s skull
Deven, who said the fall was ‘indescribable,’ was injured. A piece of metal had pierced her skull, and she also suffered a crushed femur in her left leg.
When she came to, still in the rubble, she was hysterical, but soon realized she need to be calm and get help.
‘[I realized] I have to lay my leg down somewhere, because holding the leg made me lightheaded because of the blood loss,’ she said.
She looked around the destruction and saw debris and items from different homes. She ultimately spotted a pot, which she flipped over and put her leg on.
Meanwhile, Angela was laying unconscious elsewhere in the destruction, and Edgar had been killed.
Outside, their other daughter Tayler had a ‘very difficult night’ waiting for news. She had been told that her family was unlikely to have survived because of where they had been in the building.
Angela’s husband Edgar didn’t make it, though they spent days hoping for good news while he was missing
‘I want to know why my husband lost his life,’ Angela said. ‘I want to know why they don’t have their father’
Her mother and sister, fortunately, beat the odds, and Tayler later found them being treated in the hospital.
While Deven got care for her head and leg, Angela spent five days in coma with a host of serious injuries. She’d suffered a lacerated liver and bladder, a shattered pelvis, a collapsed lung, and injuries to her spine. She had to undergo hip surgery. and now needs a wheelchair — and it may be a year before she can walk again.
But all of that is still better than paramedics and fire department workers expected: When they visited Angela and Deven in the hospital, they told them they shouldn’t be alive at all.
‘[Angela] was literally crushed, and it’s just amazing that she’s sitting up in the bed today,’ her mother, Kathleen, told NBC News.
But the devastation wasn’t over, and they spent days hoping and praying for their missing father.
They soon got the news that Edgar hadn’t made it.
Hurt: Deven, who said the fall was ‘indescribable,’ was injured
Angela spent five days in coma with a host of serious injuries. She’d suffered a lacerated liver and bladder, a shattered pelvis, a collapsed lung, and injuries to her spine
Recovery: She had to undergo hip surgery and is using a wheelchair
‘I know there’s other mothers there that have lost a husband or a child, and it’s just not OK. It’s not OK,’ Angela said
The family also lost their dog Daisy.
They also lost all of their possessions, except Edgar’s wedding ring, which had been on his body.
‘We have this thing that every week each of us get it,’ Deven said. ‘I got it for the first week of school. It’s going to be Tayler’s turn on Monday, and then after Tayler is Mama. We all just wear it.’
Angela, a mental health provider who works with underserved communities in Miami, and Deven, who plays high school volleyball, are still recovering.
Deven will need rehabilitation, and could take a year or two to recover. She has been walking but requires the assistance of a walker.
As of an August 27 update on a GoFundMe page for the family, Angela has begun to slowly regain mobility as well.
Now the family wants answers.
‘I want to know why my husband lost his life,’ Angela said. ‘I want to know why they don’t have their father, and I know I’m not the only one who lost loved ones. My heart breaks.’
‘I have my daughters, so I have something to look forward to, but I know there’s other mothers there that have lost a husband or a child, and it’s just not OK. It’s not OK.’