Weekly Updates

Project Timeline

	Week
Task	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	10
Literature study	x	x	x
Individual Writing/Work		x	x	x	x
Group Writing/Work					x	x	x
Final report preparation							x	x	x	x

Week 1                                                                 April 2 - April 8

In lab this week we started by introducing ourselves to the class and forming groups for the remainder of the term. Once we found our group: Zachery Arnold, Shadman Saqib Hassain, Mehar Kalra, and Nicholas Trainer; we began coming up with multiple ideas for what to do the project on. We came up with possible case studies, but narrowed it down to five. We are going to go about researching those in the upcoming labs and dividing up the work more appropriately once we decide what 5 structures we would like to do. Outside of lab we worked on setting up the blog and working out the kinks with it. One problem we faced was finding and editing the blog, but we have since then fixed those problems. We sent many emails and text messages to help in the understanding of the tasks we needed to complete. Also, we completed the design proposal and submitted it. To do the proposal we used Google Docs to edit it as a group. Overall we set ourselves up to get started on working on the research aspect of the project this coming week.

Here is the list of the eleven case studies

• Hyatt Regency Collapse
• Sampoong Mall Collapse
• Johnstown Flood
• De Havilland Comet
• Lotus Riverside Collapse
• "Galloping Gertie"
• The Colossus of Rhodes
• Rana Plaza
• New Orleans/ Hurricane Katrina
• RMS Titanic

Of these, we selected the Hyatt Regency Collapse (because it was the deadliest failure in US history),

the Johnstown Flood (because it provides a decent example of a dam failure), the De Havilland Comet (because it demonstrates metal fatigue), Rana Plaza (because of personal (to the disaster), and the RMS Titanic (because it demonstrates how materials influence structural integrity). 

 Week 2                                                                April 9 - April 15

This week the group divided the case studies among the members. Zac is investigating the Johnstown Flood, while Shadman is studying the Rana Plaza collapse. Mehar is looking into the RMS Titanic, and Nicholas is researching the De Havilland Comet. In addition, the group is collaborating on a single case study: the Hyatt Regency collapse. Online data bases were primarily used this week; a few members plan on going to the library in the coming weeks. In addition, the group reformatted the blog as per the T.A.'s suggestions.

Week 3                                                                April 16 - April 22

This week the group primarily focused on researching the individual case studies. The ones in which they chose to research due to either personal interest or even actually living through the event. This week was meant to get all the information we could possibly collect and record all of it on paper (take notes), so that we can present our findings to the group as a whole. Also for the purpose of putting it in the lab notebook. Over all not too many problems came up except for not being able to find documentation on the specific failure. Most times it was just the wording the group member used in the search engine. But once one thing was found on it, generally other questions came up in their mind making it easier to word their searches. This in turn enabled them to find more information. By next weeks class the group should be creating a template to follow when writing the paper and beginning work on that aspect of the project.

Comet:
The Comet was the first commercial jet liner that suffered several accidents in 1954 (see figure 1 for an image of the aircraft). The investigation determined that these accidents were caused by a structural failure of the pressure cabin due to fatigue. The Comet flew at an altitude of 40,000ft, creating a pressure differential of 8.2 psi. To determine if fatigue did cause the accident, the investigation pressurized a comet in a water tank to simulate pressurization. Cracks began to form around cut-outs and after 5500 pressurizations,  the plane ruptured. In addition, one of the crashed aircraft was recovered and rebuilt; again, the investigation determined the craft crashed due to a fatigue crack. The investigation concluded that high stress from the square windows led to rapid metal fatigue. The manufacturer, De Havilland, used average stress in their calculations, not local stress. Additionally, fracture and fatigue mechanics were not fully known at the time; thus it is hard to assign too much blame on De Havilland. As a result of the investigation, De Havilland redesigned the windows and changed the materials and return the Comet into service. As a result of crashes, De Havilland lost its competitive edge over Boeing, leading to Boeing's dominance of the commercial aircraft industry.

One paper by P.A. Whitely used modern fracture mechanics to reexamine the Comet crash. It determined that the stress at the origin of the crack was far lower than the stress on the window edge. Additionally, by analyzing the test data, the report concluded that the cracks grew faster than expected, that the initial crack size was much smaller than the investigation's estimate, and that the shape of the windows not as important as how the windows were attached.

Figure 1: The De Havilland Comet
Image from the FAA

References:
Federal Aviation Association, (n.d.).  "de Havilland DH-106 Comet 1." Lessons Learned, <lessonslearned.faa.gov> (May 6, 2015).

Withley, P. (1997) "Fatigue Failure of the De Havilland Comet." Engineering Failure Analysis, 4(2), 147-154.

Johnstown Flood:
The town of Johnstown was built into the river valley of the Appalachian Plateau. The Little Conemaugh River and the Stony Creek River run along the peripheral of the town and come together to form the Conemaugh River at the western end. There is a 657 square mile watershed that is drained by these rivers. Now once or twice a year the rivers generally overflow into the streets of Johnstown. Now the South Fork Dam is 14 miles above the city and holds back the now Lake Conemaugh. It was originally built as a reservoir for the PA Canal and would provide water to the canal system that would run from Johnstown to Pittsburgh. But this became an obsolete mode of transporting goods, so the canal system was stopped and the railroads took over. Very little maintenance was done to the dam over the years and it originally broke in 1862, but there was very little damage done to the city because the lake was only half full. After this occurred the one owner removed the drainage pipes under the dam and sold them for scrap. Eventually the dam was owned and maintained by the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club. But before the lake behind the dam was refilled the drainage pipes were not replaced. Now when the dam eventually broke on May 31 causing 2,209 deaths and bodies being found all the way to Cincinnati. over 20 million tons of water spilled out, that is the equivalent to the amount of water that goes over Niagara Falls in 36 minutes. The break in the dam caused a a wall of water about 40 feet high moving about 40 miles per hour when it hit the city of Johnstown. There was a total of $17 million in property damage and only 3,742,818.78 was collected for the relief effort from 18 different countries.

Figure 2. Shows the original design of dam before all the alterations were made (Frank).
References:
(2015)."Facts About the Johnstown Flood." Johnstown Flood Museum. <http://www.jaha.org/FloodMuseum/facts.html>(Apr. 16, 2015)

(2015)."History of the Johnstown Flood." Johnstown Flood Museum. <http://www.jaha.org/FloodMuseum/history.html>(Apr. 16, 2015)

(2015)."The South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club and the South Fork Dam." Johnstown Flood Museum. <http://www.jaha.org/FloodMuseum/clubanddam.html>(Apr. 16, 2015)


Week 4                                                                April 23 - April 29

We created a template to follow as we write our individual papers this week out of class. We presented what we found to the Professor and Fellow in class and used the ideas they gave us as well as some of our own to create this template. We found that we have a very good start on our research as well as a good place to take it. Out of class this week as we were writing some challenges we faced were not having enough information on the structure. Also trying to figure out how to put all this information into our respective papers.

Introduce Structure

-        Why was it built?

-        What was it used for?

Why it collapsed/failed?

-        What materials and systems were used in the construction of the structure?

-        What were the causes of the structural failure? (alterations made)

-        What kind of failure was it?

-        Was the failure preventable, what could have been done to prevent it?

The effect it had.

-        What were the consequences of the failure? (deaths, cost)

-        What technical lessons were learned from the failure?

-        What ethical lessons were learned?

-        What were the legal ramifications of these failures? (new codes, court cases)

-        What are your personal take-away from these failures?

Some More Information:

Comet:
In my (Nick) Materials course this week, we have discussed material failure, including fatigue. When a stress is applied to a material, it deforms elastically i.e. linear and non permanently. Beyond this, the material deforms plastically, which is permanent. The material will eventually be able to withstand a maximum stress and continues to deform until failure. However, if a material undergoes a cyclic stress to a long period of time, it can fail at stress far below normal. This failure is called fatigue. Fatigue introduces cracks into a material which grow until they reach a certain length, after which the crack rapidly spread and splits the material.

References:
Callister, W. and Rethwisch. (2014). D. Materials Science and Engineering: An Introduction, 9th Ed., Wiley, New York.

South Fork Dam:
The dam was originally constructed to provide a reliable source for the PA Canal that was to run from Philadelphia to Pittsburgh. Earth and large rocks were used in the construction of the dam. When the dam was completed it was almost 900 feet long and 72 feet high. At the base of the dam it was 220 feet thick and 10 feet wide at the top of it. Under the center of the dam a huge culvert was used to discharge water to the South Fork Creek. The culvert was controlled by five sets of valves and cast iron pipes. The culvert as well as the spillway were included to aid in removing water from behind the dam during heavy rain. After it initially broke in 1862 these pipes were removed from the dam.In 1879 Benjamin Ruff bought the dam and rebuilt it for the South Fork Fishing and Hunting Club. They made many modifications that should have been monitored closely. These dangerous modifications were:

1. outlet pipes were removed
2. lowered dam height by 2 feet (make room for two carriages to pass over at the same time)
3. trestle bridge was constructed across spillway
4. screen placed across the spillway (prevent the loss of fish)

All of these modifications along with the as-built spillway reduced the capacity of the spillway to almost a third of its intended design.

Figure 3: Sketch of drawing in Why Buildings Fall Down

References:
Levi, Matthys, and Salvadori, Mario. (2002) Why Buildings Fall Down. W.W. Norton, New York.

Frank, Walter S. (1988). "The Cause of the Johnstown Flood." Johnstown Flood.    <http://smoter.com/flooddam/johnstow.htm>(Apr. 23, 2015)

RMS Titanic

The RMS was a luxury steamship of grand size and the newest and most technologically advanced liner in the world. It featured innovative technology and was considered unsinkable. However, on a voyage out of Southampton, UK, this White Star Line ship carrying over 200 passengers struck an iceberg in the Mid Atlantic and sank.

Figure 4 is a a helpful graphic that helps to display the progression of the collapse.

Figure 4: Diagram from article Titanic Tied to Engineering.

The collapse itself was a step by step process where the collapse of one segment of the ship resulted in another one falling off. The damage first started with frame 25 of the boiler room. This is where pieces from the bottom of the ship detach from the remainder of the ship and travel throughout the ocean. After this, the stern portion of the ship comes into the water and detaches. The parts of the keel attached to the bottom of the ship started to bend. At a later stage they lost their strength and completely broke off. Later, the "Big Piece" , which is the largest recovered artifact of the titanic known, broke away and the stern separated. The stern section stood vertically before it disappeared below the surface.

References:

             Woytoywich, R. (2012). 'Titanic Sinking Tied To Engineering, Structural Failures'. The Huffington Post, <http://www.huffingtonpost.com> (May 7, 2015).

 

Week 5                                                                   April 30 - May 6

In class this week we came up with an overall template for the final paper. We simply kept the template for our "individual" papers on our respective failures we researched as the body and added two sections to it. An introduction and conclusion for clarity and a way to introduce thee paper and our though process as well as a way to conclude the paper with the impact it had on us and other engineers.

  Introduction

-        State reason of the project

-        What we wanted to get out of the project

-        Ideas we had the first day of class

-        Failures we chose with reasons as to why they were chosen

  Body

-        Introduce Structure

o   Why was it built?

o   What was it used for?

-        Why it collapsed/failed

o   What materials and systems were used in the construction of the structure?

o   What were the causes of the structural failure? (alterations made)

o   What kind of failure was it?

o   Was the failure preventable, what could have been done to prevent it?

-        The effect it had

o   What were the consequences of the failure? (deaths, cost)

o   What technical lessons were learned from the failure?

o   What ethical lessons were learned?

o   What were the legal ramifications of these failures? (new codes, court cases)

o   What are your personal take-away from these failures?

  Conclusion

-        What we got out of the project

-        Things engineers learn/account for now because of these failures

Week 6                                                                     May 7 - May 13

In lab this week we gathered as much information as we could on the final case, the Hyatt Regency Collapse. We had decided and split up the work so that Nick would complete the writing of the Hyatt Regency Collapse, Zac would complete a introduction for the paper, and Mehar would gather all of the works together and put them into a document to be submitted. We ensured to use all the correct formatting and that all the caption styles were consistent, the references were all in ASCE, and many other formatting issues we saw from one paper to another. We all read over and reviewed the paper as a whole as best as we could.

Hyatt Regency:
The Hyatt Regency was a hotel complex in Kansas City, Missouri. It consisted of three buildings: a guest tower, a function block, and an atrium connecting the two. In order to allow guests to pass back and forth between the tower and the function block, three walkways were constructed in the atrium (Luth 2000). In order to save floor space, they were suspended from the ceiling as opposed to being supported by columns. The second and fourth floor walkways were suspended above one another as detailed in Figure 5.

Figure 5: The second floor walkway was suspended underneath the fourth floor walkway (Luth 2000).

On July 17, 1981, approximately a year after the building was complete, the hotel was hosting a tea dance competition in the atrium when the second and fourth floor walkways broke free and crashed down. 114 people died as a result (Levy and Salvadori 2002).

The collapse was caused by a single, simple design flaw. The original design for the fourth floor connection detailed a single rod running from the second floor up to the ceiling. The contractor had difficult with this design and requested that a two rod system would be used instead. One rod would connect the second floor to the fourth, while another would connect the fourth floor to the ceiling. This effectively doubled the load on the fourth floor connection. Additionally, the original design was not up to code, while the second design could barely support the dead weight (Moncarz and Taylor 2000).

As a result of the collapse, the complex owner settled claims totaling over $100,000,000 and the project engineer and president of the design company lost their licenses. The legal hearing codified engineer practices and clarified the responsibilities of engineers and contractors.

Levy, M. and Salvadori, M. (2002). Why Buildings Fall Down. W.W. Norton and Company, NewYork.

Luth, G. (2000). ”Chronology and Context of the Hyatt Regency Collapse.” J. Perform. Constr.  Facil., 14(2), 51–61.

Moncarz, P. and Taylor, R. (2000). ”Engineering Process Failure—Hyatt Walkway Collapse.” J.Perform. Constr. Facil., 14(2), 46–50.

Rubin, R. and Banick, L. (1987). ”The Hyatt Regency Decision: One View.” J. Perform. Constr.  Facil., 1(3), 161–167.

Week 7                                                          May 14-20

With the draft final report complete, the group began work on the final presentation. It is suppose to last ten minutes in total. Since they are 5 case studies, this averages to 2 minutes per case study. This means that we can only give a rather brief overview of the cases. We also have decided that the cases will be presented in chronological order and that the final report will follow this structure as well. Thus, the case order is as followed:

1. South Fork Dam
2. RMS Titanic
3. De Havilland Comet
4. Hyatt Regency
5. Rana Plaza

Additionally, we developed a general template for the cases:

• Intro Slide
• Case Name
• Date
• Picture of case
• General Overview
• brief overview of history of structure to develop context
• Details of the Incident
• Mechanism of Failure
• Legal/Ethical/Technical Implications
• Final comment

We also agreed to maximize picture use and to minimize text. As a group we choose the titles as "How Things Fall Apart" as a reference to Levy and Salvadori's Why Building Fall Down, which has been an important text for our group, and William Butler Yeat's poem "The Seconding Coming".

Week 8                                                                May 21-27

This week we continued to work on the final presentation. Because of the practice secession on Week 9, we decided to have a group practice. Several members could not make it, but we were able to practice our individual sections. The practice we realized that each of our sections take about 2 minutes to present, our target time frame. However, this means that we cannot add much more in terms of content or material. Perhaps we will edit the presentation to reduce the number of text slides  and replace them with images and short videos. 

Additionally, we began to process of editing our final report based on the initial review given by the T.A. Two particular sections need to be reworded to reduce quotations, the citations need to be formatted, and the general format needs to be made more consistent.