Our U.S. building collapse injury attorneys remark that New Zealand’s Royal Commission of Inquiry called in a noted expert on structural design and collapse to help it determine the cause of the tragic collapse of the Canterbury Television (CTV) Tower in New Zealand that claimed the lives of 115 people. The expert called by the Commission is Professor John Mander, a civil engineer originally from New Zealand who is now on staff at Texas A& M University in its renowned Engineering Department.
The U.S. building collapse injury attorneys at Denena & Points clarify that the fatal CTV Tower collapsed occurred in February 2011 in Christchurch, New Zealand following an earthquake with unusually strong vertical thrust acceleration forces. The forces exceeded the design capacities of the structure, which had been built in the late 1980s under less stringent building codes.
But the real cause of the collapse may have been prior damage from a series of strong earthquakes and aftershocks in the region that began in September 2010. A September earthquake had also exceeded the CTV Tower’s design specifications, but only minimal visible damage was noted at the time and no one died. The CTV Tower exhibited increasing motion or “liveliness’ that was remarked by its occupants, particularly after the Boxing Day 2010 quake.
Professor Mander said that the CTV Tower should have been “red stickered” or barred from further occupancy following the initial earthquake. He feels that the lack of fatalities from the earlier quake may have lulled inspectors and officials into a false sense of security regarding the building’s soundness.
Mander also indicated that the CTV Tower’s survival of the initial quake that exceeded its design specifications was a testament to the sound and efficacious construction of the building. But that damage to the Tower from September 2010’s earthquake left it ill-prepared to withstand another strong quake such as it faced in 2011.
Professor Mander also criticized the comprehensive report produced after the accident by the Department of Housing and Building. He called the report “too vague o be meaningful” and indicated that its facile and generic conclusions could have applied equally well to any building collapse. Our U.S. building collapse injury attorneys emphasize that Professor Mander has called on investigators to delve deeper into the causes of structural collapse.
Mander criticized the report for failing to account for the cumulative damage from the previous quakes and aftershocks. The report attributes the fatal structural failure of the CTV Tower to damager to one of its primary support columns. When that column failed, the report says, the other concrete support columns were overloaded by gravity, causing them to fail and the building to collapse, killing 115 people.
Mander notes that anyone’s casual observation of the building could have reached that same conclusion and that ultimately, such support column failure ultimately leads to any building collapses. Our U.S. building collapse injury attorneys point out that the critical issue to examine is actually what caused the failure of the first support column. Professor Mander indicates that the cumulative damage form the successive earthquakes and aftershocks in Christchurch stressed and damaged that column, as well as other buildings in the region, beyond their intended capacity.
Mander calls for inspectors and officials to take a harder and more proactive with regard to structures following serious earthquakes. He says that it would be better to assume the worst with regard to buildings’ structural integrity and red sticker them rather than allowing them to continue to operate risking innocent lives. The Royal Commission has until early November to continue the inquiries into the deadly CTV Tower collapse. More detailed information and more sharp criticism of officials’ complacency following the series of acute earthquakes is likely to result. Stay tuned.
Learn more about deadly building collapse dangers from structural support failure in this in-depth article by our U.S. building collapse injury attorneys.