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Trump Building Collapses in NY: Could China Be To Blame?
By Paul Midler | January 15, 2008
Last year, I wrote an article describing fading quality in China, and one of the examples I used involved concrete shoring systems. Here’s the related excerpt:
“One of the most disturbing examples I have encountered while working in China involved the manufacture and importation of aluminum systems used to construct high-rise commercial buildings. These are the systems that support tons of concrete as it is being poured, and their general stability is critical.
The American company that designed and patented the system engineered all key components. It knew exactly how much each part was supposed to weigh, and yet the level of engineering sophistication did not stop the supplier from making a unilateral decision to reduce the specifications. When the “production error” was caught, one aluminum part was found to be weighing less than 90% of its intended weight.
Where did the missing aluminum go? Into the factory owner’s pocket as a cost saving. The only thing passed on to the customer was an increase in product risk. Quality fade is like the straw that broke the camel’s back–only in reverse. Suppliers push the limit by taking more and more out of the equation until they are caught, or until disaster strikes.”
The very next week after the article was published, there were two high-profile collapses of concrete projects under construction, and I mentioned them both on a blog post here at TheChinaGame.com. One was a bridge in Arizona, and the other was a casino in Las Vegas.
This week, we had a particularly high-profile collapse, at a Trump project in Manhattan.
“Preliminary reports indicate the concrete formwork on the 42nd floor failed, leading to part of the formwork collapsing onto the 40th floor. Buildings forensic engineers have determined the new building under construction is not in danger of further collapse and the crane at the site is stable.”
At the time of the bridge and casino collapses, I was in touch with an attorney who was asking me about quality issues in China (he was looking to put together a class-action lawsuit involving defective products made in China). At one point, I changed the subject and suggested that he look into collapsing concrete projects. His response was typical of a lawyer: “Is anyone dead? I can’t touch it unless someone’s dead.”
The good news (make that, bad news) is that someone has died at the Trump building, and another couple may have been injured. Maybe now there will be a little more attention given to the issue, who knows. At the very least, some responsible journalists should get involved and ask why are we seeing more collapses of concrete projects. What is it about construction in 2008 that makes it so much riskier than construction in 1978?
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[I should have more on this issue coming from an industry insider. Check back again in a few days?]
Topics: China |
January 15th, 2008 at 4:02 am
I already got one comment back on this post. To answer the question, I don’t know how many of the construction companies use a shoring system made all, or part, in China, but my understanding is that the best construction projects make use of these scaffolding systems and that they are often made in China.
I can’t provide specific details, but some of the projects that use China-made systems are very high profile. You can imagine that if a Trump building, or a billion-dollar casino, is having problems with formwork collapse…
January 15th, 2008 at 4:28 am
There’s a video segment here.
http://wcbstv.com/local/scaffold.collapse.trump.2.629412.html
There has been some talk that the Trump collapse may have been due to a crane, but others are saying that the shoring system simply gave way. One construction worker was interviewed and said “We were using an aluminum system. Usually we use steel”.
January 15th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
Thank goodness Shanghai, Beijing and Guangzhou are not in especially earthquake prone areas. That we know of…
January 15th, 2008 at 9:49 pm
Hunxuer….maybe you should look up the earthquake that hit outside Tianjin (tanggu) about 30 years ago. That’s about a 2 hour drive from Beijing and it killed about 300,000 people I think.
January 15th, 2008 at 9:58 pm
China has had some collapses, there was one insecond half of last year. A bridge that collapsed and killed some people.
January 16th, 2008 at 12:12 pm
Like I said, Salami, thank goodness the three cities I mentioned have not been hit. Yet.
I’d hate to think what one of those cities would look like after even a magnitude 3 hit…
January 17th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
When, not if, a huge earthquake hits Beijing, it’ll be the costliest natural disaster ever. All these buildings probably won’t just crash to the ground, but I believe due to shoddy construction which the Chinese are famous for, the city will become “naked”…meaning most of the “glued-on” concrete veneer that covers all the buildings will crack and fall off. That’s guaranteed. The buildings themselves may be so damaged that they will have to be brought down after the fact. It’s going to be ugly.
January 20th, 2008 at 8:57 am
Eagerly await some facts and figures.
January 20th, 2008 at 9:27 am
JX - You don’t need to await anything. They concrete form structure collapsed on its own, and it was made of aluminum. These systems are most often made in China, as are the supports. And I’ve gone and listed other recent cases of concrete construction projects collapsing while in process. Why not try to answer the question at the bottom of the post - what’s different about concrete construction today versus a few decades ago? PM
January 21st, 2008 at 8:02 am
Paul, remember the 1981 Kansas City Hyatt Regency collapse that killed some 100 people? I don’t think you have successfully established it as a fact that today’s construction in the US is riskier than decades ago. Sometimes memory can play trick on people, which is why I didn’t dispute with the argument that there was no similar high-rise construction collapse in recent memory in China — that’s my recent memory.
On top of it, I think I can easily argue that it may have been caused by the decline of quality of education among the Gen X/Y, without facts and figures. The theory goes, the Baby Boomer generation is among the best educated in the developed world, and the Gen X/Y is among the worst. Hence once the Gen BB starts retirement, you will see the decline of the US manifested in various forms including the decline of workmanship.
January 23rd, 2008 at 9:40 pm
Thanks for commenting, JXie, but I named THREE major concrete projects that have seen a partial collapse in the last nine months. You named one from 25 years ago.
Another reader might have pointed to the large incidence of concrete project failures in China, but I would never do that.
January 24th, 2008 at 9:10 pm
Paul, the 1981 incident killed some 100 people, and it was the building collapse with most fatalities in the American history, until the WTC tower collapses in the 9/11 terrorist attack. The ones you quoted, had no fatality. Had we not had this exchange, I wouldn’t have remembered them a few years from now. Chances are there were a whole lot of incidents similar to the scale of your cases, but overtime they just don’t register in anybody’s mind any more.
Many often talk about the “good ol’ days”. But once you pull out numbers such as life expectancy, you can’t help but think the idea of “good ol’ days” is only memory playing trick on people.
Don’t get me wrong, you _may_ end up being right. But if you want others (such as me) to take your theory seriously, you ought to get some more facts and figures.
The recent collapse in China was a bridge in Hunan. Remember I said high-rise construction because bridge construction is somewhat a different animal (my old man was a civil engineer so I know a bit about it). But anyway, the builder was detained. If he is found liable to the collapse, likely he will have a harsh prison term if not executed. In construction, accountability can be easily held, hence in my opinion in China it is far safer than say food that you may subject to fly-by-night ops. Once you take accountability away, it doesn’t matter who the people are, you-know-what will hit the fan soon. Witness the recent subprime meltdown, when risk is spread into the system instead of being assumed by the underwriters, people will abuse it.
January 24th, 2008 at 9:18 pm
Re-read the Trump SoHu hotel story, a worker died. But the point still stands — few will remember it a few years later.
I have to admit I don’t know much about this, but China imports A LOT of building raw material such as aluminum and exports almost none. What’re the trading stats of “concrete shoring systems”?
January 28th, 2008 at 9:51 am
one prominent story in recent years in the US was the collapse at a New Jersey casino expansion.
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C06E1DD143DF933A05757C0A9629C8B63&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=all