Deathtrap: Moore tornado debris reveals construction flaws, code violations

[Old Fart]

MOORE -- Instead of offering protection from the tornado on May 20, 2013, Plaza Towers became a deathtrap, Briarwood a pile of rubble.

Detailed in a soon-to-be-released report for the American Society of Civil Engineers and the Structural Engineering Institute, an analysis of the debris of the Briarwood Elementary School showed that several of the building’s steel roof beams were not attached to the walls, many of Briarwood’s cinder-block walls were not properly reinforced with steel rebar and large portions of the walls were not backfilled with concrete.

http://newsok.com/deathtrap-moore-t...ruction-flaws-code-violations/article/3935877

Related articles:
http://newsok.com/article/3929373
http://newsok.com/plaza-towers
http://newsok.com/ongoing/may-20-tornadoes

Cheapest plan and lowest bidder.

 

[KOPBET]

"Marc Levitan, a researcher with the National Institute of Standards and Technology, says Plaza Towers and Briarwood elementary schools exhibited typical construction for schools of their time and couldn't have been expected to stand up to an EF5 tornado."

“For buildings of that period, in our experience, it's not uncommon for walls to be unreinforced or minimally reinforced,”

 

[TJay74]

You do realize both of those schools were built at least 20+ years ago, maybe even closer to 30 years ago before building codes had been updated.

 

[swampratt]

Does not surprise me at all.
I was fixing a leak at my brother-in laws house..he had most of the sheetrock removed to get to the outside faucet
when i showed up.
What i seen was at the corner of the house...You have the sheetrock interior wall no insulation then brick.
No kidding no vapor barrier , no plywood...they framed his home and then stuck up the bricks then went inside and hung rock.

I heard that plywood did not have to be installed at that time the home was built ..But on the corners it had to be there.
His house has none..built 1980's in yukon ok.

He always wondered why his heating and cooling bills were in the mid 200's.

Nothing anymore surprises me.
except ...
I went to plaza towers in 1976 and it was there before i was by 10 years i think

 

[Jestik]

Sometimes a tornado is just a tornado and nothing could stop it from destroying what it wants to.

 

[4play]

Strange that all those houses and other buildings didn't stay up either. That 7-11 was what a year or two old and look what happened to it. The hospital did pretty good at staying up but took heavy and un-repairable damage. I would say when any building takes a direct hit from a tornado with winds in excess of 200 MPH there is good chance its not going to survive and sadly the people inside may not either.

 

[mtnboomer]

Nothing - and I mean absolutely NOTHING - above ground will stand up to a direct hit from a tornado F3 or larger. Safe rooms are just a "feel good" option to any construction. Yes, they are safer than nothing if the twister bypasses you, but a tomb if it lands on top of you.

Those schools were built to all applicable building codes of the time. No one will be held accountable.

 

[cowadle]

one thing that just burns my ass. at least in my area when the newer schools were built the architect and the districts all swore the school was being built to withstand a tornado!! the hallways were supposed to be a shelter!! now all of that is out the window and we need to borrow more money to build more above ground crap designed by the same architects that sold us the last bill of goods. i think we should hold the architects that designed these safe structures and the contractors that were part of the deal feet to the fire and get their bond money and possible criminal charges for fraud and worse. the old schools always had some sort of underground way of sheltering the children.

 

[yukonjack]

Nothing - and I mean absolutely NOTHING - above ground will stand up to a direct hit from a tornado F3 or larger. Safe rooms are just a "feel good" option to any construction. Yes, they are safer than nothing if the twister bypasses you, but a tomb if it lands on top of you.

Those schools were built to all applicable building codes of the time. No one will be held accountable.

You don't even know what your talking about. When you've seen firsthand a number of above ground safe rooms that have survived a direct hit from an F5 then maybe your opinion will have some value.

 

[Dave70968]

You don't even know what your talking about. When you've seen firsthand a number of above ground safe rooms that have survived a direct hit from an F5 then maybe your opinion will have some value.

Can you show me a picture of one that survived a direct hit from a 200MPH F-150 picked up by the tornado?