Rana Plaza collapses

[LiviuM]

A building:

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Collapsed

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Although:

The Industrial Police on Tuesday had instructed the garment owners to keep their factories closed after a big crack appeared in the building. They wanted to bring in an engineer from BUET to decide if the structure was safe for use, Mustafizur Rahman, Director for Industrial Police told reporters at the site of the collapse.

The people responsible acted very wrong.

The Rana Plaza is owned by Md Sohel Rana. He had apparently said the cracks were nothing serious.

None of us wanted to go in. The bosses came after us with beating sticks. At the end we were forced to get in.

Not only earthquakes kill people.

[r3be1]

greed also does, and it kills more people than any earthquake.

that`s human's nature.

[mecheil.edwar]

I see one photo in the link number 3

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that the vertical columns are ok.. it is failed only at top and bottom of column..
it means the capacity of these columns are ok..

and some saying there was cracks ...but as the faliure of columns are sudden failures ...

SO I expect two senarios for this collapse ..

Senario No 1 : the week points between Flat Slabs and columns ... specially in the right side of building as I can see in the photo the most of collapse in this side

Senario No 2 : the weak points in the columns at the first floor of building , I mean the columns at first floors reached to max capacity and overstressed+ Senario 1... so propagation of collapse start from columns ...

But I expect 90% Senario 1...
It is badly to do not have enough photos to understand what happend..

Condelense to all victims

[ykhackhack]

I think columns crushed at the top joint
Also Concrete's color looks very bad. Poor quality.
My condolences

[ykhackhack]

I heard on the radio that some of the upper floors of this building were added on later, without even permit.
If it is true , what a shame

[mecheil.edwar]

I heard on the radio that some of the upper floors of this building were added on later, without even permit.
If it is true , what a shame

It means The capacity of columns decreased , which will create weakness of the first floors columns...

But Still I see Failure due to Weakness in connection between columns & Flat Slabs..

Best Regards

[andersen3]

the vibrations of the generators from the top floorcan be added to the weak points in the columns at the first floor of building & Weakness in connection between columns & Flat Slabs & floors of this building were added on later.

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Shortly before 09:00 a.m. the electricity went off, as it often does in Bangladesh. When the heavy generators inside Rana Plaza were started, floors and ceilings gave way in a cascade of bursting walls, tumbling equipment and screams.

some pictures here:

[mecheil.edwar]

@ Andersen,

Thanks for these photos

I have the following conclusions :

1- The Roof is in a good condition (Photo-2)

2-I see some failures at Joints Between Top & Bottom of Columns With Beams & Slabs
( Photo 2&3)

3- the Building is surrounding by other existing Buildings (Photo 1&2)
it means the chance of failure due to lateral Movement is very less..

4- Photo Number #4 is very important photo...
It is very clear to see the explosion of concrete happend at connection between Columns & Beam ..
And one more important thing in this photo , we can see shortage of Links in at this Joint
Look Carefully , you will not see any Stiurps to confine the column
and Look again you can see the the total Length of column is in a good condition
But Badly the weak Point in the column at connection between Beam& Column leads to this failure ....

4- The Strucutral System of Buidling is RC Frames (Beams + Columns)

5- the number of floors > 5 Floors


From these Notes I expect the failure Happened due to two Reasons

1- Senario #1 : Connections Between Col& Beams Are Good
But due to overloads on ground floor , 1st & Second columns.. so failure start from these floors and then Propagate to upper floors..

Upper Floors , Columns in A good conditions , but due to addition moments that added to connections due to failure of below floors.. so Second failure mode start at these Joints as we can see in the photos

2- Senario #2 : All Columns are in a good condition , Weakness at joints
Failure Start from Below Floors at the Joints ( See Photo 1 Chain of columns are in a good condition)

[Petrit]

Look the difference :The masonry buildings is everything ok,but the reinforced concrete frame buildings is ???
I think something wrong with the overall sustainability of buildings.

[bhuiyan]

I also want to comment in this issue though this building collapsed few days ago near dhaka.
At present I am living in Dhaka. Why this building collapse? You don't have to be a civil engineer to understand from this accident , if you just considering the below reason:
1. This building is design for 5 story with authority approval. but the building was actually 9 story done by the politically powered Mr. Rana. He forced to increase the building height.
2. this soil condition was too poor. before the building there was a pond or canal which may not properly piled or filled.
3. What was the occupancy of that structure ? Residence or commercial ?
4. The day before Rana plaza collapsed,industrial police and municipal engineer found a huge crack and visited by all the concerned and garments worker. Garments worker were forced to do the work by the employer.
5. When they started working, there was an electricity dropped and heavy generator activated automatically. Generator produced the excess dynamic/machine load which was the key reason to collapse.
Rescue of dead body and debris is finished yesterday (14.5.2013)
Total Death (as per newspaper) = 1127 person
undefined dead body found = 293
injured = 2438 (approx)
Government has taken heavy initiative after the RANA PLAZA collapse but still we have another 70 to 80% risky building in major Dhaka city. What will happen if dhaka hit by a major earthquake? I am just going blind to see the future of us !!!