Quotables

“It was like a mini 9/11.”

NICHOLAS BALBOA, a Phoenix resident who was walking a dog outside in Surfside, Fla., while visiting relatives when 12 floors of the Champlain Towers South condo building collapsed suddenly on June 24. One of the first bystanders on the scene, Balboa told The Washington Post he helped rescuers find a boy calling out from the rubble.

“I cried, her mother too.”

ANASTASIOS KERLIDOU, describing to Reuters his reaction after hearing his daughter Alexandra, who has cerebral palsy, play music on the “EyeHarp.” The software program uses an eye-tracking camera to allow the 21-year-old to play notes using only her eyes.

“For athletes the whole thing feels like a bad joke.”

Belgian weightlifter ANNA VANBELLINGHEN, 27, criticizing the policy of allowing biological males who identify as women to compete in sports against females, according to the Inside the Games website. On June 21, New Zealand weightlifter Laurel Hubbard, 43, became the first transgender athlete to qualify for the Olympic Games.

“I’m clearly playing in a game that, for me, has moved past the fourth quarter and into overtime.”

Billionaire businessman WARREN BUFFETT, announcing on June 23 his retirement from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s board of trustees. Buffett, the CEO of Berkshire Hathaway, is 90.

“I realized I’m in a whale’s mouth, and he’s trying to swallow me.”

Cape Cod lobster diver MICHAEL PACKARD, telling Boston TV station WBZ about a humpback whale that Packard says nearly ate him during a dive on June 11. “I thought to myself, ‘Hey, this is it. I’m going to die,’” said Packard, 56. He said the whale spit him out after about half a minute.