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This is so hard for everyone involved. Do these images really mean "the building will collapse in 2 days?" The contractor clearly thought it was "a lot of work

This is so hard for everyone involved. Do these images really mean "the building will collapse in 2 days?" The contractor clearly thought it was "a lot of work" but not to the level of "this building needs to be condemned immediately". So many articles are screaming "look at that paint chipping and concrete exposure, obviously the building was going to go collapse" I don't think it's so obvious or am I just naive?

8ytecoder 5y ago
This is media doing the media thing. In fact even small cracks are perfectly fine - it at least that’s what our civil engineering professor told us. In hindsight everyone of these minor ones will be put under a microscope. That said, if the building had a pattern of these it’s probably not very well maintained.
- beerandt 5y ago
  Cracks are actually required for reinforced concrete to work properly. The concretes got to give so the steal can take the tension, and you want big cracks to show up during before and during failure, specifically because it's a warning sign. But it's highly dependant on size and location.
beerandt 5y ago
You're absolutely correct. RC design is very complex, but very conservative. There should have been 'oh shit' levels of cracking and rebar exposed, and in specific places. That's not what the infamous "inspection" showed. And even then, it should have tolerated multiple complete local failures before cascading catastrophic failure. ETA: It's hard to see in these photos bc of the the quality, but the rebar in the pool pump room is more concerning than anything in the 2018 report, but still doesn't look anywhere close to failure. (Actual structural inspections should be able to clearly show cracks 1/16th" or smaller, at a resolution you can measure them from the picture) Edit 2: The equipment room in that picture didn't even collapse.
bb88 5y ago
Isn't that why you need inspections with competent structural engineers on a frequency of much much less than 20 years between inspections?
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- pp19dd 5y ago
  Yep, in the ideal world. But: A- major proportion of civil/structy engineers are going into retirement, their numbers not supplanted by new blood. It's just not a calling anymore. B- USACE redacts their dam and bridge inspection databases by zeroing out inspection dates. They're obviously managing the external perception of this process, and internally prioritizing best they can. C- they only have ~32k employees, of which there are only so many pertinent engineers, handling 200k bridges and 90k dams. Overwhelmed is an understatement. Then there's the budget situation. D- then there's the buildings.
  - bb88 5y ago
    Completely agree, but none of those issues seem insurmountable. High paying jobs are always in fashion and the demand for those jobs should increase because the public doesn't like seeing children dead in rubble.
    - pp19dd 5y ago
      Sure. Guess my actual point was the lead time- it takes years to attract potential students, train them into engineers, give them some experience under the belt. Years to build up an effective workforce to fill this gap. Decade? Perhaps decades to fill this somewhat specialized labor deficit?
cratermoon 5y ago
As a total layperson all I can add is that I've read that any time there's concrete with exposed and wet rebar that's an immediate "o shit". https://theconversation.com/the-problem-with-reinforced-concrete-56078 https://theconversation.com/the-problem-with-reinforced-conc...
- asmithmd1 5y ago
  That is what I thought. I sent this picture of a bridge carrying I-95N to MassDot a year ago: https://imgur.com/gallery/ZSMg1pZ https://imgur.com/gallery/ZSMg1pZ They cleaned up the chunks of concrete that had fallen from the beam.
  - tedd4u 5y ago
    Wow, that looks really bad.
  - zenexer 5y ago
    Yikes--it looks even worse on Google Street View.[0] That appears to be bridge P-03-023.[1] According to MassDOT, it was built in 1959 and "reconstructed" in 2010--which apparently meant "replacing the bridge decks, ... and upgrading bridge and approach railings,"[2] not fixes to the part that appears to be disintegrating. It was last inspected in 2019.[1] [0]: https://www.google.com/maps/@42.5194293,-70.9935589,3a,75y,330.4h,93.77t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1suHP9ElojeD4RX1t9xRLrkw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192 https://www.google.com/maps/@42.5194293,-70.9935589,3a,75y,3... [1]: https://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/viewer.html?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgis.massdot.state.ma.us%2Farcgis%2Frest%2Fservices%2FRoads%2FBridges%2FMapServer&source=sd https://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/viewer.html?url=https%3A%... [2]: https://hwy.massdot.state.ma.us/ProjectInfo/Main.asp?ACTION=ViewProject&PROJECT_NO=604981 https://hwy.massdot.state.ma.us/ProjectInfo/Main.asp?ACTION=...
- touristtam 5y ago
  I like the explanation that concrete isn't set in stone so to speak: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jul/04/why-roman-concrete-still-stands-strong-while-modern-version-decays https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jul/04/why-roman-co...
handmodel 5y ago
I agree with your larger point. We are only seeing the data point of a building that everyone said had a lot of work and then collapsed. But, for all we know, 10% of all large buildings would have some element that one subset of contractors would flag as being very dangerous. Still, I think it is an illuminating case study. Given how big the death toll is, I'm very open to the idea that building inspections need more transparency or more technology.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
PragmaticPulp 5y ago
The photos could indicate a general lack of proper maintenance and concern, but these photos aren’t even from the part of the building that collapsed: > The equipment room runs along the southern wall of the building — an area that did not collapse. The internet commentary isn’t very helpful. We need to wait for official reports, but the media will try to extrapolate from any tiny pieces of information in the mean time
- Gibbon1 5y ago
  The media and a lot of people want to frame this as a melodrama and are now casting about for someone to play the part of the villain.
- hcrisp 5y ago
  Yeah, I noticed a lot of attention in the media is on the pool support corrosion, but it apparently did not collapse, though it seems to have emptied out. With the other anecdotal notes about the subfloor pumps wearing out and water pooling in the subfloor garage closer to the building, it seems more likely there was a longstanding leak that lead to a sinkhole forming or perhaps rebar corrosion. I recall from my civil engineering course that concrete has a high compression yield point but a poor tensile one, hence the need for rebar. Take away part of the foundation or wear away the structure in such a way that the weakened rebar is forced to take the load, and suddenly you have a catastrophic failure like the one that occurred.
- ummonk 5y ago
  If another part of the building was in such bad condition, there is a high probability that the part of the building that collapsed was also in bad condition.
version_five 5y ago
The contractor was a pool contractor. He saw from experience that it looked bad, but was not in any position to pronounce on the structural integrity. Semi related, I live in a very badly maintained major city, where driving under many bridges we can see cracking, big chunks of concrete that fell away, exposed re bar, etc. To me it looks very scary, but I have no real reference point. If a bridge collapses, the news will be able to interview someone who says what I said above about the appearance, but the only thing that really matters is an engineer's report.
- betaby 5y ago
  Montreal?
  - ggm 5y ago
    I hate to say this, but almost anywhere in North America has the right weather conditions, and lack of local/state/federal funding models to cause this problem. I don't know enough about the south to comment, but I could believe MX and below have the same problem due to lack of capital works programs I believe in the US governance space there was a proposal for a 10-40y roads and bridges reconstruction effort. I have no idea if it survived factional politics.
  - cryptoz 5y ago
    Sounds like the turcot to me.
    - ant6n 5y ago
      Or the old Champlain
- bagels 5y ago
  It's already dangerous because those chunks of concrete can fall on people or cars.
  - kube-system 5y ago
patmorgan23 5y ago
Well the contracter isn't a structural engineer so he can't make the determination that "this building will collapse in two days". The media has definitely been exaggerating the evidence that management had, but it's still clear that they needed to be more aggressive in inspection and restoration.
- tamaharbor 5y ago
  I doubt either the HOA or the condo owners would have been amicable to a costly special a$$essment for restoration. Everyone is a good quarterback after the fact.
  - MattGaiser 5y ago
    Indeed. The condo members could have easily been the ones fighting action. My grandparents used to own a condo where the people there were unwilling to spend money on anything. What would have been a couple hundred dollar special assessment morphed into a several thousand one very quickly multiple times, as nobody was willing to spend the money fixing things.
  - shagie 5y ago
    That was covered apparently in April. https://www.wsj.com/articles/miami-area-building-collapse-condo-board-president-warned-of-need-for-repairs-in-april-letter-11624930495 https://www.wsj.com/articles/miami-area-building-collapse-co... > The president of the Champlain South Towers condo association told residents in April their building was in desperate disrepair and urged them to pay the $15 million in assessments needed to fix structural problems, in a letter reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. > ... > The purpose of the letter, dated April 9, 2021, was to explain to residents the worthiness of the construction projects for the 40-year-old building ahead of the following week’s meeting about a proposed special assessment of $15 million to be paid by residents.
    - in_cahoots 5y ago
      Even if they had given the money, there’s no way the work would have been completed (or started, most likely) before the collapse. If anyone knew that the building was in danger of structural failure it should have been condemned, not renovated with residents in place.
s5300 5y ago
My understanding was that there's literal years of earlier documented to-be-fixed (fairly urgently) issues that this contractor wasn't looking at this go around.
adamredwoods 5y ago
Morabito Consulting did a survey almost 3 years before, listing repairs that needed to be done. I think images like this is just evidence that lawyers will accumulate. The media will just use these images to add drama. In West Seattle, they shut down the bridge from cracks, but it did take them a while. >>Those taut tendons serve to push the concrete together like giant rubber bands. They help the concrete resist the gravity and other forces that could crack or otherwise pull it apart. >>“In most cases [of] cracked concrete, you're not too bothered about the concrete not operating properly,” Stanton said. “You are worried about the steel inside becoming corroded.” https://www.kuow.org/stories/city-has-known-about-cracks-in-west-seattle-bridge-since-2013 https://www.kuow.org/stories/city-has-known-about-cracks-in-...
- irjustin 5y ago
  oh wow, i'm from Seattle (abroad since 2013) and didn't know that bridge closed! Such a major artery to West Seattle being shut down. Getting in and out of Alki must be annoying af. Obviously great that they caught it and have a rapid response, but pretty crazy.
  - NegativeLatency 5y ago
    It’s in a tunnel now, kinda a big deal for a long time. The TBM got stuck and stuff
    - nutellatoast 5y ago
      They're referring to the West Seattle Bridge, which was recently closed due to structural issues. It seems you're referring to the Alaskan Way Viaduct, which was also not structurally sound, but was replaced with a tunnel.
- paul_f 5y ago
  I keep hearing about lawyers, but who exactly gets sued? The victims are also the building owners. Seems it was their responsibility?
dheera 5y ago
I mean, the US has a huge culture of waiting for shit to happen before doing something about it. People don't take warning signs seriously. It happens in buildings, it happens with electrical fire safety, it happens in healthcare (insurance and doctors largely don't believe in prevention in my experience).
- fosk 5y ago
  It works like this everywhere in the world. Humans are...humans
- kube-system 5y ago
  Yes, but the US also generally takes pretty swift action to make regulatory changes when disasters happen. Florida (and Miami-Dade County in particular) is known for their strict building code now, and I'm sure we'll see some additional changes as a result of this.
  - dheera 5y ago
    I suppose, but people had to die for those changes to happen. They should have taken pictures of warning signs seriously. They should have had emergency forces onsite within hours of those pics getting to the bottom of what's going on, and evacuating the building.
    - kube-system 5y ago
      They say: the history of safety regulation is written in blood.
cryptoz 5y ago
The contractor was there to assess a cost for cosmetic improvements to the pool. If the building owners knew of the structure problems years in advance why was there a cosmetic improvement to the pool happening anyway? Should have spent the money on actual improvements not cosmetic pool updates.
- Jtsummers 5y ago
  This is a common behavior. Maintenance is frequently deferred until something catastrophic (but hopefully not too catastrophic) forces it and then usually the cost is much higher than on-going maintenance would have been. Cosmetic improvements, on the other hand, get enough visibility to be addressed more readily. Changing a building's facade, cleaning up the entry area and gardens, but totally neglecting cooling systems and water systems (as examples of systems needing maintenance but with usually less-than-fatal consequences when neglected). It's very frustrating, and common to most (if not all) industries.
- jonas21 5y ago
  The cosmetic improvements were going to be done as part of the same project to correct the structural issues. > The contractor visited the condo building last week to put together a bid for a cosmetic restoration of the pool as well as to price out new pool equipment — a small piece of the multimillion-dollar restoration project that just was getting underway at the 40-year-old building. When lots of people have to agree on something, it's easier to batch everything up into one vote. It's the same reason we get giant spending bills in Congress instead of more focused ones.
elliekelly 5y ago
I think part of it is a need to feel like this isn’t something that can just happen. It helps to feel like “the system” or “someone” should have known but dropped the ball. That way we can tell ourselves if our building were in the same situation, we’d know. This wouldn’t (and couldn’t) happen to me is a comforting lie we like to tell ourselves whenever theres a tragedy. I think maybe humans as a species aren’t so great at processing freak accidents. For some reason it’s easier to accept when we have someone to blame - real or imagined.
- Sebb767 5y ago
  Well, you/one personally really can't worry about the structural safety of all buildings and infrastructure you're exposed to. You simply don't have knowledge, permission or time. That's why we need the system to take care of this and prevent such accidents from happening, as well as imposing general emergency safety in case of fire etc.. Otherwise, our current life would simply be impossible.
moralestapia 5y ago
I live in a small building with just 3 units (again, only THREE owners). An issue w/ the building came up in January, it's been six months and we still haven't agreed on who are we going to hire, who is going to pay for what, etc... I can only think it is essentially impossible to get 20+ tenants to agree on something that involves them spending money, time, inconvenience, ...
- bagels 5y ago
  The HOA decides and sends everyone a bill, presumably.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- VortexDream 5y ago
  From the final paragraph > We have covered so much ground already to get the project rolling, it’s not surprising everyone is still asking about those items. Everything reviewed in this letter has been publicly presented, discussed, and voted on as necessary. We have discussed, debated, and argued for years now, and will continue to do so for years to come as different items come into play. Sounds like you're not far off with your assumption. From the author's tone, it feels like he's annoyed.
beerandt 5y ago
The images show a location that wasn't even part of the collapse. So no you shouldn't interpret that as "about to fail".
ummonk 5y ago
My impression from the headline was that this would be a minor issue, but exposed and severely corroded rebar is very much extremely bad.
eitland 5y ago
I worked in concrete repair for half a year, I mostly only used the jack hammer and angle grinder but I paid some attention. Here is what I think I know: When rebar corrodes it expands and that means even more air, water and salt can reach even further into the construction, meaning even more rebar is exposed and starts corroding. Edit: this probably weakens the concrete as well both because of exposure to the atmosphere and because of the cracking action but this last one is just an educated guess from my side. How we worked was our foreman went first with an ultrasound device to detect the rebar and how much cover it had. He'd then sample the concrete by cutting into it, knocking out one side of the cut using a hammer and spray indicator fluid (I guess fenolftalein) on it. If the concrete turned pink it was healthy. You could measure how far out it was healthy. If the measurements rebar was out in the damaged concrete we would expose it and apply protection before closing the wound. Sometimes we would also use a sledgehammer to adjust the rebar somewhat. A number of factors influence how long concrete lasts before it needs maintenance: - How far rebar is buried. - The quality of the concrete as it leaves the mixer - If the driver had lunch break or got stuck in traffic after loading the truck and added water to prevent anyone from noticing. Concrete starts curing immediately after mixing so you have limited time before it needs to be in the mould - How well the concrete was vibrated to make sure it filled all gaps and that no significant air pockets was left - How close you are to the sea There's always someone on HN who knows something about everything and hopefully this was one of my turns to satisfy some of the curiosity for someone :-D Edit: working with those older guys was really interesting. Seing a 70-year old bloke throw around tower lift parts that I figured I didn't have a chance of lifting. All the stories. The time I played with a bunch of cards and one of them askes to borrow it and started showing off crazy tricks; turned out he had a bronze medal from Nordic magic for juniors (and since he was now close to retirement and his hands were large and swollen I also got a chance to see what was really happening :-) It was also the first place I know that actually practiced HSE. Others laughed but this team had 1-2% extra profit margin and I remember we got a nice bonus too. Ended up at around $15/hr which was close to twice what I used to get for much harder and dirtier work. This was the spring of 2001. They liked me so when I left for school I got a nice job cleaning the work sites.
imtringued 5y ago
They didn't see a collapsing building 2 days ago. The article mentions water damage as early as 1990. Blaming the problem on the last person that touched the building is absurd.

8ytecoder 5y ago

This is media doing the media thing. In fact even small cracks are perfectly fine - it at least that’s what our civil engineering professor told us. In hindsight everyone of these minor ones will be put under a microscope. That said, if the building had a pattern of these it’s probably not very well maintained.

beerandt 5y ago
Cracks are actually required for reinforced concrete to work properly. The concretes got to give so the steal can take the tension, and you want big cracks to show up during before and during failure, specifically because it's a warning sign. But it's highly dependant on size and location.

beerandt 5y ago

You're absolutely correct. RC design is very complex, but very conservative. There should have been 'oh shit' levels of cracking and rebar exposed, and in specific places. That's not what the infamous "inspection" showed. And even then, it should have tolerated multiple complete local failures before cascading catastrophic failure. ETA: It's hard to see in these photos bc of the the quality, but the rebar in the pool pump room is more concerning than anything in the 2018 report, but still doesn't look anywhere close to failure. (Actual structural inspections should be able to clearly show cracks 1/16th" or smaller, at a resolution you can measure them from the picture) Edit 2: The equipment room in that picture didn't even collapse.

bb88 5y ago

Isn't that why you need inspections with competent structural engineers on a frequency of much much less than 20 years between inspections?

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
pp19dd 5y ago
Yep, in the ideal world. But: A- major proportion of civil/structy engineers are going into retirement, their numbers not supplanted by new blood. It's just not a calling anymore. B- USACE redacts their dam and bridge inspection databases by zeroing out inspection dates. They're obviously managing the external perception of this process, and internally prioritizing best they can. C- they only have ~32k employees, of which there are only so many pertinent engineers, handling 200k bridges and 90k dams. Overwhelmed is an understatement. Then there's the budget situation. D- then there's the buildings.
- bb88 5y ago
  Completely agree, but none of those issues seem insurmountable. High paying jobs are always in fashion and the demand for those jobs should increase because the public doesn't like seeing children dead in rubble.
  - pp19dd 5y ago
    Sure. Guess my actual point was the lead time- it takes years to attract potential students, train them into engineers, give them some experience under the belt. Years to build up an effective workforce to fill this gap. Decade? Perhaps decades to fill this somewhat specialized labor deficit?

cratermoon 5y ago

As a total layperson all I can add is that I've read that any time there's concrete with exposed and wet rebar that's an immediate "o shit". https://theconversation.com/the-problem-with-reinforced-concrete-56078 https://theconversation.com/the-problem-with-reinforced-conc...

asmithmd1 5y ago
That is what I thought. I sent this picture of a bridge carrying I-95N to MassDot a year ago: https://imgur.com/gallery/ZSMg1pZ https://imgur.com/gallery/ZSMg1pZ They cleaned up the chunks of concrete that had fallen from the beam.
- tedd4u 5y ago
  Wow, that looks really bad.
- zenexer 5y ago
  Yikes--it looks even worse on Google Street View.[0] That appears to be bridge P-03-023.[1] According to MassDOT, it was built in 1959 and "reconstructed" in 2010--which apparently meant "replacing the bridge decks, ... and upgrading bridge and approach railings,"[2] not fixes to the part that appears to be disintegrating. It was last inspected in 2019.[1] [0]: https://www.google.com/maps/@42.5194293,-70.9935589,3a,75y,330.4h,93.77t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1suHP9ElojeD4RX1t9xRLrkw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192 https://www.google.com/maps/@42.5194293,-70.9935589,3a,75y,3... [1]: https://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/viewer.html?url=https%3A%2F%2Fgis.massdot.state.ma.us%2Farcgis%2Frest%2Fservices%2FRoads%2FBridges%2FMapServer&source=sd https://www.arcgis.com/home/webmap/viewer.html?url=https%3A%... [2]: https://hwy.massdot.state.ma.us/ProjectInfo/Main.asp?ACTION=ViewProject&PROJECT_NO=604981 https://hwy.massdot.state.ma.us/ProjectInfo/Main.asp?ACTION=...
touristtam 5y ago
I like the explanation that concrete isn't set in stone so to speak: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jul/04/why-roman-concrete-still-stands-strong-while-modern-version-decays https://www.theguardian.com/science/2017/jul/04/why-roman-co...

handmodel 5y ago

I agree with your larger point. We are only seeing the data point of a building that everyone said had a lot of work and then collapsed. But, for all we know, 10% of all large buildings would have some element that one subset of contractors would flag as being very dangerous. Still, I think it is an illuminating case study. Given how big the death toll is, I'm very open to the idea that building inspections need more transparency or more technology.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

PragmaticPulp 5y ago

The photos could indicate a general lack of proper maintenance and concern, but these photos aren’t even from the part of the building that collapsed: > The equipment room runs along the southern wall of the building — an area that did not collapse. The internet commentary isn’t very helpful. We need to wait for official reports, but the media will try to extrapolate from any tiny pieces of information in the mean time

Gibbon1 5y ago
The media and a lot of people want to frame this as a melodrama and are now casting about for someone to play the part of the villain.
hcrisp 5y ago
Yeah, I noticed a lot of attention in the media is on the pool support corrosion, but it apparently did not collapse, though it seems to have emptied out. With the other anecdotal notes about the subfloor pumps wearing out and water pooling in the subfloor garage closer to the building, it seems more likely there was a longstanding leak that lead to a sinkhole forming or perhaps rebar corrosion. I recall from my civil engineering course that concrete has a high compression yield point but a poor tensile one, hence the need for rebar. Take away part of the foundation or wear away the structure in such a way that the weakened rebar is forced to take the load, and suddenly you have a catastrophic failure like the one that occurred.
ummonk 5y ago
If another part of the building was in such bad condition, there is a high probability that the part of the building that collapsed was also in bad condition.

version_five 5y ago

The contractor was a pool contractor. He saw from experience that it looked bad, but was not in any position to pronounce on the structural integrity. Semi related, I live in a very badly maintained major city, where driving under many bridges we can see cracking, big chunks of concrete that fell away, exposed re bar, etc. To me it looks very scary, but I have no real reference point. If a bridge collapses, the news will be able to interview someone who says what I said above about the appearance, but the only thing that really matters is an engineer's report.

betaby 5y ago
Montreal?
- ggm 5y ago
  I hate to say this, but almost anywhere in North America has the right weather conditions, and lack of local/state/federal funding models to cause this problem. I don't know enough about the south to comment, but I could believe MX and below have the same problem due to lack of capital works programs I believe in the US governance space there was a proposal for a 10-40y roads and bridges reconstruction effort. I have no idea if it survived factional politics.
- cryptoz 5y ago
  Sounds like the turcot to me.
  - ant6n 5y ago
    Or the old Champlain
bagels 5y ago
It's already dangerous because those chunks of concrete can fall on people or cars.
- kube-system 5y ago

patmorgan23 5y ago

Well the contracter isn't a structural engineer so he can't make the determination that "this building will collapse in two days". The media has definitely been exaggerating the evidence that management had, but it's still clear that they needed to be more aggressive in inspection and restoration.

tamaharbor 5y ago
I doubt either the HOA or the condo owners would have been amicable to a costly special a$$essment for restoration. Everyone is a good quarterback after the fact.
- MattGaiser 5y ago
  Indeed. The condo members could have easily been the ones fighting action. My grandparents used to own a condo where the people there were unwilling to spend money on anything. What would have been a couple hundred dollar special assessment morphed into a several thousand one very quickly multiple times, as nobody was willing to spend the money fixing things.
- shagie 5y ago
  That was covered apparently in April. https://www.wsj.com/articles/miami-area-building-collapse-condo-board-president-warned-of-need-for-repairs-in-april-letter-11624930495 https://www.wsj.com/articles/miami-area-building-collapse-co... > The president of the Champlain South Towers condo association told residents in April their building was in desperate disrepair and urged them to pay the $15 million in assessments needed to fix structural problems, in a letter reviewed by The Wall Street Journal. > ... > The purpose of the letter, dated April 9, 2021, was to explain to residents the worthiness of the construction projects for the 40-year-old building ahead of the following week’s meeting about a proposed special assessment of $15 million to be paid by residents.
  - in_cahoots 5y ago
    Even if they had given the money, there’s no way the work would have been completed (or started, most likely) before the collapse. If anyone knew that the building was in danger of structural failure it should have been condemned, not renovated with residents in place.

s5300 5y ago

My understanding was that there's literal years of earlier documented to-be-fixed (fairly urgently) issues that this contractor wasn't looking at this go around.

adamredwoods 5y ago

Morabito Consulting did a survey almost 3 years before, listing repairs that needed to be done. I think images like this is just evidence that lawyers will accumulate. The media will just use these images to add drama. In West Seattle, they shut down the bridge from cracks, but it did take them a while. >>Those taut tendons serve to push the concrete together like giant rubber bands. They help the concrete resist the gravity and other forces that could crack or otherwise pull it apart. >>“In most cases [of] cracked concrete, you're not too bothered about the concrete not operating properly,” Stanton said. “You are worried about the steel inside becoming corroded.” https://www.kuow.org/stories/city-has-known-about-cracks-in-west-seattle-bridge-since-2013 https://www.kuow.org/stories/city-has-known-about-cracks-in-...

irjustin 5y ago
oh wow, i'm from Seattle (abroad since 2013) and didn't know that bridge closed! Such a major artery to West Seattle being shut down. Getting in and out of Alki must be annoying af. Obviously great that they caught it and have a rapid response, but pretty crazy.
- NegativeLatency 5y ago
  It’s in a tunnel now, kinda a big deal for a long time. The TBM got stuck and stuff
  - nutellatoast 5y ago
    They're referring to the West Seattle Bridge, which was recently closed due to structural issues. It seems you're referring to the Alaskan Way Viaduct, which was also not structurally sound, but was replaced with a tunnel.
paul_f 5y ago
I keep hearing about lawyers, but who exactly gets sued? The victims are also the building owners. Seems it was their responsibility?

dheera 5y ago

I mean, the US has a huge culture of waiting for shit to happen before doing something about it. People don't take warning signs seriously. It happens in buildings, it happens with electrical fire safety, it happens in healthcare (insurance and doctors largely don't believe in prevention in my experience).

fosk 5y ago
It works like this everywhere in the world. Humans are...humans
kube-system 5y ago
Yes, but the US also generally takes pretty swift action to make regulatory changes when disasters happen. Florida (and Miami-Dade County in particular) is known for their strict building code now, and I'm sure we'll see some additional changes as a result of this.
- dheera 5y ago
  I suppose, but people had to die for those changes to happen. They should have taken pictures of warning signs seriously. They should have had emergency forces onsite within hours of those pics getting to the bottom of what's going on, and evacuating the building.
  - kube-system 5y ago
    They say: the history of safety regulation is written in blood.

cryptoz 5y ago

The contractor was there to assess a cost for cosmetic improvements to the pool. If the building owners knew of the structure problems years in advance why was there a cosmetic improvement to the pool happening anyway? Should have spent the money on actual improvements not cosmetic pool updates.

Jtsummers 5y ago
This is a common behavior. Maintenance is frequently deferred until something catastrophic (but hopefully not too catastrophic) forces it and then usually the cost is much higher than on-going maintenance would have been. Cosmetic improvements, on the other hand, get enough visibility to be addressed more readily. Changing a building's facade, cleaning up the entry area and gardens, but totally neglecting cooling systems and water systems (as examples of systems needing maintenance but with usually less-than-fatal consequences when neglected). It's very frustrating, and common to most (if not all) industries.
jonas21 5y ago
The cosmetic improvements were going to be done as part of the same project to correct the structural issues. > The contractor visited the condo building last week to put together a bid for a cosmetic restoration of the pool as well as to price out new pool equipment — a small piece of the multimillion-dollar restoration project that just was getting underway at the 40-year-old building. When lots of people have to agree on something, it's easier to batch everything up into one vote. It's the same reason we get giant spending bills in Congress instead of more focused ones.

elliekelly 5y ago

I think part of it is a need to feel like this isn’t something that can just happen. It helps to feel like “the system” or “someone” should have known but dropped the ball. That way we can tell ourselves if our building were in the same situation, we’d know. This wouldn’t (and couldn’t) happen to me is a comforting lie we like to tell ourselves whenever theres a tragedy. I think maybe humans as a species aren’t so great at processing freak accidents. For some reason it’s easier to accept when we have someone to blame - real or imagined.

Sebb767 5y ago
Well, you/one personally really can't worry about the structural safety of all buildings and infrastructure you're exposed to. You simply don't have knowledge, permission or time. That's why we need the system to take care of this and prevent such accidents from happening, as well as imposing general emergency safety in case of fire etc.. Otherwise, our current life would simply be impossible.

moralestapia 5y ago

I live in a small building with just 3 units (again, only THREE owners). An issue w/ the building came up in January, it's been six months and we still haven't agreed on who are we going to hire, who is going to pay for what, etc... I can only think it is essentially impossible to get 20+ tenants to agree on something that involves them spending money, time, inconvenience, ...

bagels 5y ago
The HOA decides and sends everyone a bill, presumably.
deleted 5y ago
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VortexDream 5y ago
From the final paragraph > We have covered so much ground already to get the project rolling, it’s not surprising everyone is still asking about those items. Everything reviewed in this letter has been publicly presented, discussed, and voted on as necessary. We have discussed, debated, and argued for years now, and will continue to do so for years to come as different items come into play. Sounds like you're not far off with your assumption. From the author's tone, it feels like he's annoyed.

beerandt 5y ago

The images show a location that wasn't even part of the collapse. So no you shouldn't interpret that as "about to fail".

ummonk 5y ago

My impression from the headline was that this would be a minor issue, but exposed and severely corroded rebar is very much extremely bad.

eitland 5y ago

I worked in concrete repair for half a year, I mostly only used the jack hammer and angle grinder but I paid some attention. Here is what I think I know: When rebar corrodes it expands and that means even more air, water and salt can reach even further into the construction, meaning even more rebar is exposed and starts corroding. Edit: this probably weakens the concrete as well both because of exposure to the atmosphere and because of the cracking action but this last one is just an educated guess from my side. How we worked was our foreman went first with an ultrasound device to detect the rebar and how much cover it had. He'd then sample the concrete by cutting into it, knocking out one side of the cut using a hammer and spray indicator fluid (I guess fenolftalein) on it. If the concrete turned pink it was healthy. You could measure how far out it was healthy. If the measurements rebar was out in the damaged concrete we would expose it and apply protection before closing the wound. Sometimes we would also use a sledgehammer to adjust the rebar somewhat. A number of factors influence how long concrete lasts before it needs maintenance: - How far rebar is buried. - The quality of the concrete as it leaves the mixer - If the driver had lunch break or got stuck in traffic after loading the truck and added water to prevent anyone from noticing. Concrete starts curing immediately after mixing so you have limited time before it needs to be in the mould - How well the concrete was vibrated to make sure it filled all gaps and that no significant air pockets was left - How close you are to the sea There's always someone on HN who knows something about everything and hopefully this was one of my turns to satisfy some of the curiosity for someone :-D Edit: working with those older guys was really interesting. Seing a 70-year old bloke throw around tower lift parts that I figured I didn't have a chance of lifting. All the stories. The time I played with a bunch of cards and one of them askes to borrow it and started showing off crazy tricks; turned out he had a bronze medal from Nordic magic for juniors (and since he was now close to retirement and his hands were large and swollen I also got a chance to see what was really happening :-) It was also the first place I know that actually practiced HSE. Others laughed but this team had 1-2% extra profit margin and I remember we got a nice bonus too. Ended up at around $15/hr which was close to twice what I used to get for much harder and dirtier work. This was the spring of 2001. They liked me so when I left for school I got a nice job cleaning the work sites.

imtringued 5y ago

They didn't see a collapsing building 2 days ago. The article mentions water damage as early as 1990. Blaming the problem on the last person that touched the building is absurd.