After more than four years and nearly $40 million, the federal investigation into the disaster at Champlain Towers South is homing on what has been the prime suspect as the initiation point of the collapse: a poorly constructed and reinforced section of the pool deck.

Engineers with the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) also told advisory committee members they have found even earlier signs that the building in Surfside was failing months before the collapse that killed 98 people.

In retrospect, it seems, Champlain Towers South was trying to tell us something months before collapse: that it was in distress.

For the first time, leaders of the probe showed photos of a sliding glass door that could have been one of those signs.

It broke twice, with one side “stuck in a

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