50 Years Old Three-storey School Building Collapses

[kellyhound]

Local media report nobody was injured in the incident as the school had been closed to give students extra time to study for upcoming exams.

The startling incident was recorded by an onlooker at the Carmel School in the town of Madhupur in the Indian state of Jharkhand.

In the video, the three-storey building, which is reportedly over 50 years old, can be seen with small piles of construction material in front of it when it suddenly comes crashing down.

The whole building appears to collapse and onlookers can be heard gasping in shock as a dust cloud envelopes the area.

Reports state some members and staff and construction workers who had been carrying out repairs on the building had rushed to safety when the building first started showing signs of collapse.

Local Sub-Divisional Officer Shri Prasad and a team of officials went to the scene and started an investigation into the incident. It is not yet known what caused the collapse.

Prasad reportedly ordered the school not to re-open until the other buildings have been checked by government engineers.

Reports state after the collapse parents gathered in front of the school in protest against the risk their children had been put in by previously attending classes in the unstable building.

The investigation into the causes of the collapse is ongoing.

[RiversEdge]

50 years ago, built by the lowest bidder.

[AngelAssassin]

My house is almost three times that old…

[azblue81]

Life expectancy of anything or anyone in India is 49 max.

[Roosta]

Lucky no kids were in school !

[b0g]

flashback to the hotel/app collapse in Florida last year
collapse originated in basement

an engineer listed what can and could have gone wrong: rebar used was too thin, rebar must overlap over a certain length, the ratio concrete and rebar must be in a range, avoid spalding: e.g. ground water penetration has to be considered and checked in time...

[houseoftechno]

Easy to figure out the cause of this collapse:

1. The 5 adjacent columns (circled) failed at the same time.
2. They are the bottom columns which are bearing the most weight.
3. Looks like the current renovation work blasted off the spalled outer layer of the columns so the new paint has a solid bite.
4. Between the aged steel reinforcement (rebar turns to rust inside unsealed concrete) and the reduced column area from the paint prep sandblasting, the columns failed in a single trigger event. Explosive failures are typical for concrete.
5. The workers must have seen the sagging first floor and stuck up wooden poles to prop up the structure.