Miami-Dade woman dies after fall from West Palm Beach condo under construction

A 23-year-old woman fell to her death Saturday morning while working on a high-rise construction project in West Palm Beach, city police said.

Though authorities were still piecing together what happened, it appears that Yamileth Martinez-Ponce was doing work at La Clara, the luxury condominiums now under construction at 1515 S. Flagler Drive, when she fell from a balcony, police spokesman Mike Jachles said.

He said investigators believe that Martinez-Ponce, a resident of the Allapattah neighborhood in Miami-Dade County, was on the 13th-floor when she fell just before 9 a.m.

“She worked for a flooring company, and for reasons we don’t know, she apparently fell off of that balcony,” Jachles said.

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Martinez-Ponce dropped to the second floor and died at the scene, he said.

The West Palm Beach Police Department’s Homicide Unit was investigating the death, and OSHA — the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration — is expected to launch its own review.

The site off Flagler Drive was home to the 1515 Tower condos for decades, before a controlled implosion brought down the building in February 2010.

Construction of the 25-story La Clara condominiums began in March 2019 and is expected to finish by spring 2023, according to a past interview with Great Gulf, the project’s Canada-based developer.

Giuseppe Sabella is a reporter at The Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach him at [email protected]. Help support our journalism and subscribe today. 

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: Miami woman falls from La Clara condo construction in West Palm Beach