Why the Austin Scaffolding Failed

[IlPadrino]

Read here for an article that I found very interesting... sometimes it's the smallest "oversight" that can cause catastrophic results.

 

[kevo_55]

I didn't think that you could even buy grade 1 bolts anymore.

 

[Paul S]

Just this spring we had a project where something similar happened with bolts, but no injuries occurred. A490 bolts and squirters were being installed in house on a structure and one bolt broke during installation. After the bolt was brought to my attention the first thing I noticed is that is was an A325 bolt, not an A490. Unfortunately I did not indicate the grade of bolt on the shop prints since there was only one size bolt needed for the entire installation. I did provide the correct information to the purchaser, and he provided the correct info to the supplier, but it turns out that a new employee at the supplier decided all by himself to save us some money that he would substitute A325 bolts for the A490 bolts. Yet he still provided A490 squirters. The broken bolt occurred after 60 others were installed, and luckily one broke or who know what could have happened.

So the people involved in messing this up are:

Myself - grade not indicated on drawing (although I would have caught this during my final inspection)

Purchaser - did not catch this when checking the received order, or on the quoted price which indicated the substitution

Supplier - for changing the order and not realizing the DTIs would not work with the supplied bolts.

Installers - for not realizing the DTIs were not matching the bolt grade.

 

[Capt Worley PE]

System failure is almost always a long string of errors.

 

[C-Dog]

System failure is almost always a long string of errors.

Yep, all human made disasters are not because of one failure, but becuase of multiple failures that cascade.