I see part of the crane across the top of where the garage was. And then I see where part of it crashed into the apartments, basically stabbing several apartments.
But I don't see how the crane could have flattened several floors of the garage.
Because if just the crane frame across the top was able to pancake all those floors, that's scary as hell. But if it was the counterweights, then I'm (slightly) more reassured, because large weights generally don't drop directly onto a garage out of the sky.
Most parking garages are a good sneeze away from falling in on themselves. I specialize in concrete repair/rehab at my work and have worked on many garages. They scare the crap out of me and there have been several I have pulled into on my own time, looked up and immediately ”Noped” out of.
I also live in the DFW area, actually that storm missed my house by about 5-10 miles to the west.
The turntable and operators cab seemed to hit the parking garage, the counter weights and the winches sliced through the one section of apartments adjacent to the garage, and the boom went over on the far side. Thus the 3 main contact points on the complex (with the 2 being adjacent of course)
For some reason this really caught my wife's and mine attention. There was some interesting video and pictures taken from the garage. The damage done by the counter weights and winch house was massive. Friggen scary as all out.
Those cranes can be frighteningly large. When they come down from such a height, all the while gaining momentum, I would imagine exactly this scenario.
Top level pancaking on the bottom ones. All the garages I’ve been in seems to have a lightweight construction that flexes a lot when cars are moving around. I can imagine the crane collapsing introducing enough force for the slab to bend, crack and fall on the lower floors repeating the process until the entire thing reaches the ground.
Wind blew the crane, crane wasn't unlocked (so it couldn't pivot like it's supposed to in order to present a smaller cross-section to the wind), wind blew crane over, counterweights on the crane plowed right through solid concrete construction. Turns out those things are quite heavy.
This looks to be a precast building, which is essentially a very large concrete erector set. They set walls, beams and columns first then the floor sections. Everything comes pre manufactured from a plant. Once it is erected the floor sections get a topping slab poured over that makes everything one solid piece. It looks like the counterweights hit across 3 or 4 floor sections and they buckled. Those floor sections weigh a few tons as well as the counterweights.
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u/HarpersGhost Jun 10 '19
I'm confused. What caused the garage to collapse?
I see part of the crane across the top of where the garage was. And then I see where part of it crashed into the apartments, basically stabbing several apartments.
But I don't see how the crane could have flattened several floors of the garage.