Florida firefighters honor missing kids from collapsed condo
Tearful Florida firefighters are collecting kiddie toys they find in the rubble of last week’s building collapse and adding them to a makeshift memorial — in hopes the little owners will eventually collect them.
One of the heartbreaking items placed at the foot of a fence lined with “Missing” posters of loved ones is a Winnie the Pooh bear whose red shirt reads “Baby’s 1st Pooh Bear.”
The stuffed bear is covered in pulverized dust.
“Yesterday, I saw a group of five firefighters. They walked toward the memorial, and they were holding toys,’’ a man told a local CBS-TV affiliate at the touching scene in Surfside near Miami Beach on Monday.
“And they placed the toys, and they had tears in their eyes,’’ the witness said.
“It’s incredible, it’s just so powerful to think that maybe one of those toys belonged to a child who is unfortunately no longer with us,’’ he added.
The children’s items also included a small fire truck and a blow-up baby doll.
“It’s a real place of comfort,’’ the man said of the site, which included cards and flowers among other personal mementos.
Eleven people have been confirmed dead — with another 150 still missing. It’s not clear how many children are still unaccounted for, but the list includes two little girls, ages 6 and 7, who are missing along with their families.
