bobzilla said:One of these posts finally hit home for me. I kept reading "40 yo structure" and I'm thinking "yeah, anything built in the 60's like that would be deteriorating". This was built in the 80's Crap I'm older than I remembered
I am now replacing things I built/designed early on in my life due to them aging out. I feel old.
In reply to bobzilla :
I keep doing the same thing. 20 years ago was the 80s. Oh wait. No it's not. Crap.
bobzilla said:One of these posts finally hit home for me. I kept reading "40 yo structure" and I'm thinking "yeah, anything built in the 60's like that would be deteriorating". This was built in the 80's Crap I'm older than I remembered
I was involved with the construction of the Sky Dome, in Toronto, at the beginning of my career. It was considered an absolute state of the art baseball stadium at the time. There's now serious discussion of tearing it down and rebuilding it due to it being so old and dated.
iansane said:In reply to bobzilla :
I keep doing the same thing. 20 years ago was the 80s. Oh wait. No it's not. Crap.
That's the problem with radio stations advertising 80's 90's and Today!
Today! Covers 20 years...
The first major project I was involved with was torn down 15 years ago.
You're not old until your orthopedic surgeon starts talking about replacing the replacement that you already have in a joint. Most are designed to last 10-15 years of fairly light use. When you have three joints that were replaced prior to your 40th birthday, that conversation starts occuring at a startling age.
Slippery said:They are evacuating another building
Just saw that and if I read the news story correctly the management company presented the engineers report that was six months old basically saying the building was not safe.
What is wrong with these people. I recently had a residential building that I was called out to and I found a 4story brick and stone wall on the verge of falling. The top of the 4th story was leaning out by almost 6 inches over a sidewalk. I issued a letter that shut down the street and the building with in hours. We had structural netting in place in 24 hours and the building shored up in less than a week. Contractor is now in the process of taking the wall down and rebuilding it.
Mr_Asa said:In reply to bobzilla :
Hell, I was built in the 80s and I barely think of myself as being in my 30s. Near 40 is right out
Oh berkeley me. I just realized that by this time next year I'd be eligible for retirement from the USAF.
Should have stayed in, damnit.
It would seem the story has shifted to the background. Additional buildings are being evacuated.
My family in the Homestead and Miami area all live in single family homes but it is interesting reading what they are writing about the tone of the area.
Many have already moved on. The cities and counties are scrambling to figure out what to do next while dealing with the politics that is focused on blaming someone rather than focussing on the solution to move forward safely.
I did applaud the one woman professional structural engineer that was able to deftly dismantle a news reporter and her talking head. Any effort they made to sensationalize what was happening she took from them and responded by providing clear, rational, relatable engineering responses. Most important of those was the relatable terms or layman terms that she used wherein I could understand the deep technicality but a reporter or non engineer could understand as well. Essentially that skimming the 2018 engineering report and seeing exposed rebar in one photo of a building doesn't mean it is about to fall down and it actually points to the efforts of condo association, engineer, and city working to maintain the building. However the timeline was not predictable and obviously needed to be shorter than it was.
In reply to Advan046 :
Exactly.
I wince every time I hear a news report. They all seem to say "It was the salt water" (which disregards the fact that every bridge, viaduct, canal structure, or high rise condo in the entire state of FL has footings and piers sitting in salt water), or "poor maintenance" (which ignores the fact that exposed rebar with a maintenance style patch over it is just a bandaid on a problem- it doesn't fix anything structural).
Those buildings had flaws. It's not normal for a commercial building to fall down after 40 years. Media speculation that has zero understanding of engineering only succeeds in creating fear.
Which is kinda the point (because fear sells).
I'd like to see the local authorities launch an investigation into government corruption that may have existed at the time of construction and during more recent inspections and reports. It should have already started, with a particular emphasis on other buildings built by the same developer and engineer or in a similar geographic area that may have been inspected by the same inspectors during that time period.
Instead the mayor just keeps getting on the news saying "Oh this is so sad- we are here for you" and pointing the finger at others.
In reply to SVreX (Forum Supporter) :
Is an investigation into government corruption that may have existed at the time of construction a good use of taxpayer dollars? The original "culprits" (if any) would probably be dead or dying off by now if there's even records of who they were. Does the city still have records on employees with SS#'s that far back to determine exactly which John Smith was a building inspector? Are the companies still in existence? Even if they could pin the blame on a company or more, or officials "on the take", what would be the benefit for the expense?
An investigation into current practices and the recent inspections and reports seems like the place to spend money with the biggest benefit.
In reply to NOT A TA :
Considering the required repairs were noted in the 2018 40 year inspection required. And notice given to the tenants about the millions of dollars required to repair. I think this is one instance of the government actually doing the job they were supposed to.
Don't worry, deaths will always bring out the lawyers. (Something about sharks and blood would seem proper here. )
But the tenants association were told. Their neglect makes them culpable. And any that survived have that to look forward to.
In reply to NOT A TA :
It may open some eyes to how useless bureaucracies actually are. Those who can, do. Those who can't, inspect. There are some truly stupid people that work for the government and if you are depending on them to keep you safe, you are a fool.
NOT A TA said:In reply to SVreX (Forum Supporter) :
Is an investigation into government corruption that may have existed at the time of construction a good use of taxpayer dollars? The original "culprits" (if any) would probably be dead or dying off by now if there's even records of who they were. Does the city still have records on employees with SS#'s that far back to determine exactly which John Smith was a building inspector? Are the companies still in existence? Even if they could pin the blame on a company or more, or officials "on the take", what would be the benefit for the expense?
An investigation into current practices and the recent inspections and reports seems like the place to spend money with the biggest benefit.
Considering the construction boom in Miami in the 80s, I can think of a whole bunch of reasons to dig into what sort of corruption existed back then.
For example: https://www.wsj.com/articles/miami-condo-buildings-old-age-collapse-champlain-towers-11626271508
NOT A TA said:In reply to SVreX (Forum Supporter) :
Is an investigation into government corruption that may have existed at the time of construction a good use of taxpayer dollars? The original "culprits" (if any) would probably be dead or dying off by now if there's even records of who they were. Does the city still have records on employees with SS#'s that far back to determine exactly which John Smith was a building inspector? Are the companies still in existence? Even if they could pin the blame on a company or more, or officials "on the take", what would be the benefit for the expense?
An investigation into current practices and the recent inspections and reports seems like the place to spend money with the biggest benefit.
The main benefit I can see is to find out if corruption allowed other slipshod buildings to be built, if any still exist, and how long any of those buildings might continue to exist.
In reply to NOT A TA :
Don't really care who the "culprits" are. I care about saving lives.
I can almost guarantee someone was bribed, and that it was normal practice for the developer. An investigation should look at who did inspections then so other buildings inspected and built by the same people can be checked.
SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:In reply to NOT A TA :
Don't really care who the "culprits" are. I care about saving lives.
I can almost guarantee someone was bribed, and that it was normal practice for the developer. An investigation should look at who did inspections then so other buildings inspected and built by the same people can be checked.
Even if there weren't bribes, it was common to ask for or demand exceptions from the city
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/community/miami-dade/miami-beach/article252467273.html
I'd be prioritizing buildings and corruption that may have happened in the '80's much more than current operations. It's the older buildings that could kill people.
Corruption was common. Miami was a good place for corruption.
Today, a building like that would require 3rd party special inspections by qualified engineering firms (in addition to the municipal inspections). Those special inspections include compressive break testing on all the concrete poured, and verification of concrete mix strength, slump, and quality. They also include inspections of the rebar, thickness, etc.
It's likely corners were cut 40 years ago to save money that contributed to the building failure. Third party inspections may or may not have existed, but SOMEBODY inspected.
If I was mayor of Miami, I would assume whoever inspected that building berkeleyed up. I'd be looking at any other building inspected by the same person (s). And I would have ALREADY identified any buildings of concern, and ordered current inspections of them by qualified personnel.
"Feel good" government is worthless.
Even with inspection, shenanigans are possible. There is an area near me that is commonly called the "crack slab" area. Apparently the developer put the rebar in the slab (most homes in CA are build on a concrete slab) for inspection, then moved the rebar to the next set of houses for those inspections, then poured the slabs without the rebar. The result was not dangerous of course, but I did see one house (while looking at a car in the yard) with a good 2 inch wide and 6 inch tall crack in it!
It does seem like the moving of rebar would be a lot of work and I am not sure how they saved that much doing this, but it was done. The fix BTW sometimes involved moving the entire house to the back yard and re-pouring the slab (I think they also cut out and re-poured the slab from the inside on many of them)
Point: It's very hard to stop a determined a-hole, no mater how many obstacles you put in their way.
In reply to aircooled :
That's true. But I strongly doubt that happened in FL. Even if it did, my suggestion that an investigation into other buildings built by the same developer would cover that.
My point was that there are ways for the government and authorities to be pro-active RIGHT NOW, instead of the hand-wringing and boo-hooing that is going on.
The current government response is pathetic.
SVreX (Forum Supporter) said:In reply to aircooled :
That's true. But I strongly doubt that happened in FL. Even if it did, my suggestion that an investigation into other buildings built by the same developer would cover that.
My point was that there are ways for the government and authorities to be pro-active RIGHT NOW, instead of the hand-wringing and boo-hooing that is going on.
The current government response is pathetic.
I agree with you that they should, but maybe they are already investigating?
In reply to Slippery :
You may be right, in which case I would happily stand down. Have you heard of any such investigation going on? I have not.
If I was mayor, I would have made an announcement within days of the incident that I had ordered a full investigation.
There's a big difference between investigating what happened to THIS building (to prove culpability), and what possible similar things could have happened to other buildings built at the same time (to prevent further incidents).
I think the latter is more important, because it could save lives.
Apparently I didn't make my point well. Corruption was the norm back then.
My thought was that rather than spending money trying to figure out who was corrupt years ago, the taxpayers money should be spent to move forward. SVreX's suggestion to look at other buildings built by the same company is an excellent example. It doesn't matter so much who did what back then compared with how we can try to prevent a similar instance from occurring. If they used poor building practices on one building they likely did it elsewhere. So lets spend money to look closely at those buildings.
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