I’m guessing Discovery will dust off their occasional show “Failure Analysis.” The handful of installments they made were very well done and extremely interesting.
What are the odds that someone, or several someones, will go to jail as a result of this?
But the stubborn fact is that the installation *did *fail. Sure, the engineers will say, “It was the installers’ fault,” but even then, if you ask me, that doesn’t let the engineers off the hook. If the entire safety of the installation is based on the installers doing everything flawlessly, and also depends 100% on the viability of the bond between the epoxy and the concrete, then I think that’s an engineering issue. The simple truth is that the ceiling could have been engineered differently, and made safer.
You know, that may be the final determination, we’ll have to wait and see. But, the thing is with engineering, at some point, you’re going have to trust that things will be done correctly. If you designed every single thing for the ultimate worst-case scenario, no matter how far-fetched, nothing would ever get built. They’d be too expensive and too big. Structural engineering design has to balance safety and economics.
Impossible to say for sure at this point, but some sort of massive lawsuit is certain, and I’d say winnable. The key question is of criminal negligence, which might be tough to prove.
The entire project could have been engineered differently, and made safer as well. Each lane could have been in its own tunnel to minimize traffic accidents. All steel could have been quadruple sized. But the Big Dig cost 14.2 Billion dollars, and people were complaining about the cost. A major piece of infrastructure simply cannot be designed to be absolutely foolproof. It’s impossible, and even if it weren’t, nobody would be willing to pay for it.
Hey, the anchors could have been badly designed. I’m no structural engineer, I’m a dirt person. Maybe the engineers were at fault, maybe the manufacturer, maybe the construction firm, maybe the Turnpike Authority, and maybe the inspectors. It was most probably a combination of all those groups. I doubt any particular person will ever be considered fully responsible for what happened. And I hope that Attorney General gives up his posturing about criminal negligence. From what the newspapers say, one would have to prove that people installed pieces that they knew for a fact would kill someone, and that is just ludicrous.
Well, a major piece of the puzzle is that Modern continental (the contractor that installed the ceiling panels) has gone banrupt and was resold. The installation of the ceiling bolts and epoxy took place in 1999, and the records are now being looked for. Since the federal government is now involved 9and a crimianl investigation is under way), everything being taken out of the tunnel is now evidence.
I forsee a long, expensive investigation, ending with jail sentences for a few low level people. the higher-ups at the MTA will all escape liability-chairman Amorello is already reminding people that the job was done before him.
Most large public works projects in MA end with indictments-the state government is hopelessly corrupt, and so much graft was paid on the "Big dig’, that everybody has an incentive to keep their moths shut.
Understood, but I think they leant too far to the economics side of the equation. To Mithril’s point, I don’t think the difference in cost would have been that significant, particularly in the overall context. And especially since some are now suggesting that the ceiling wasn’t even necessary in the first place.
But to add that level of attention throughout the project would have been cost prohibitive. Nobody knew that these anchors would fail. To have given them special design consideration would have been unreasonable without extending the special consideration to the rest of the project, driving up the cost astronomically. Imagine how much of the Zakim Bridge’s stability is based on welding and installation of bolts, then consider how much of the local soil had to be compacted to a certain extent, and concrete vibrated, etc. There is always going to be something that shoddy construction can mess up; there is *never * going to be the ability to control it all.
My father has been boycotting the Big Dig forever (personally, I think he’s just put out about the 3$ fee) so we ALWAYS have to drive through Chelsea (as he hunches over the steering wheel and crows over his cleverness) but the last time he picked me up at Logan we had to go through the tunnel to get home. The bridges you have to go over to cross the Mystic are under repair.
??
You only have to pay a $3 fee for crossing the Tobin Bridge on US 1, which isn’t part of the Big Dig. You can avoid it by going down 93 South instead (you can get there from Route 1 by getting off onto route 60 or Revere Beach Parkway or Route 16). Aside from the Ted Williams Tunnel, I don’t think there are any fees to use any part of the Big Dig.
But what are you basing this opinion on? I don’t have enough information to make a decision and I’m a structural engineer who happens to work for one of the companies involved in the Big Dig. (although I’m not anywhere near Boston and I don’t have any inside information) Right now, all we know are bits and pieces of what happened and we don’t have the full story.
Okay, perhaps I’m not using the terminology correctly. Despite the fact that I’ve listed Massachusetts as my permanent address since I was 12, I’ve only lived there sporadically since the age of 18, as I keep getting shipped out of state for college and work. I’ve never really used the Big Dig because I grew up in Lexington and just drove straight through into Cambridge on Route 2 or Mass Ave.
You know when you exit Logan and you get to the little man-booths where you have to pay 3$ and then go on the big bridge with all the cables? That’s what my father always wants to avoid. When going TO Logan, you don’t have to pay a fee and you use a tunnel-you only pay the fee on the way back on the I was under the impression this counts as the Big Dig. Sorry if I was unclear or it doesn’t.
Now, I’ve kind of forgotten the way we get to Chelsea-when we lived in Lexington we would take Route 2, then go through Somerville, I think on Route 16?? into Chelsea (it goes along the Mystic). Now I’m pretty certain my father gets on 93 towards Boston (my parents moved next door to Bedford a couple of years ago, and it’s built on Route 3/95 and Route 2 is a PITA) and then gets off at the exit right before the Bridge starts and finds his way from there.
Sorry if I’m not pinning down what I mean exactly for you-I can visualise this in my head but I forget the names of the relevant roads-these are taxi routes my dad learned from flying in and out of Logan at least once a week for the last 13 years. Right now that little bridge you have to cross to skirt on to the alley that gets you on (I think it’s) Route 1 in Chelsea-the one that opens up for the tugboats to pass through, is under repair so my father’s favourite back routes are all muddled up for him and he’s been reduced to driving on the cable bridge.
In that case you’re paying $3 for the use of the Callahan or Sumner Tunel – again, not part of the Big Dig.
If you want to avoid paying when leaving Logan, you can always go north up Route 1A, then cut across on Route 60 and pick up Route 1 north there. There are ways to get elsewhere, as well. You don’t have to go through the Shawmut peninsula of Boston.
Of course, then you wouldn’t get to ride on that suspension-cabled Howard P. Zakim-Bunker Hill Memorial Bridge, but you can find some other excuse to ride it. For free.
You would have to really hate paying tolls to do this if you’re planning on heading South.
Rather difficult, seeing as I live across the country and my sister and brother (in-law) fled Boston for Chicago. Now now, I don’t know if the free comment is a snide slam or you’re just being jocular but the fact that my father is willing to drive 30 minutes out of his way to save 3$ when it’s pretty clear he can afford it, is what I love about him. I am, as he often tells me, a wretched spoiled child, who is perfectly willing to fork over the 3$ anytime I’m forced to drive.
What the bloody hell is the Big Dig then??? After my parents moved to Bedford, and I wanted to go visit my sis and bro in Boston I used to have to take 93 to that big suspension bridge then go through some tunnel to emerge on to Storrow Drive and wend my way to the Newbury street area where he used to live.
I hhhhhhate that my parents moved to a town that makes getting to Route 2 tiresome. They only live 4 miles away from our old house in Lex but it means having to rearrange my whole highway life when I visit.
I disagree (speaking as a structural engineer). You don’t balance safety, you design with the appropriate factors so that you can demostrate that the design is safe when properly built. You do so while keeping things as cost effective as you can, but you never willingly sacrifice safety for economics. The issue seems to be in construction and it seems that either the specs were too loosely written or there was not adequate construction inspection.
But I’m having a bit of trouble following your descriptions. Logan Airport is to the right, and the “big bridge with all the cables” sounds like the Zakim Bridge, which is over the Charles River at the top left. The Ted Williams Tunnel (which is part of the Big Dig) and the Sumner and Callahan Tunnels (which have been around for decades) are the main routes to and from Logan, and have tolls (coming inbound to the city only). The main north-south part of the Dig (including the Zakim Bridge) is Interstate 93, and is free.
Seeing as I am confusing everyone I’ll actually call the crazy bastard up tonight and get the names and numbers of the highways we take in order to avoid said offending toll-geez, I hope you realise I’m not lying about being from there!!
Yeah, but if they’re going across the Zakim Bridge then they’re clearly going North, and are in a good position to avoid paying any tolls at all by avoiding the tunnels.
If you’re in town trying to negotiate the Big Dig, it means that you can ride the Bridge for free when you’re in town.
I’m working backward from the fact that the panels fell and killed someone, and that a lot of the other panel supports, on inspection, have been found to be dangerous. As a structural engineer, would you want that on your resume, even if you could correctly argue that the implementation was at fault? Wouldn’t you toss and turn at night thinking of other ways you could have designed it – say, with smaller, lighter panels, or an entirely different way of holding them up?
In fact, there were engineers on the project who wondered just that. Too bad they were a little bit late to the dance.
