- Webinar No: WBNR-1116
- PDH Units: 2
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- Webinar No: WBNR-1116
- PDH Units: 2
Intended Audience: All Engineers
Credits: 2 PDH Units
When: Wednesday 11/2, 2 - 4 pm ET
This Webinar will examine the ethical issues that arose from the 1981 collapse of atrium lobby walkways at the newly constructed Hyatt Regency Hotel in Kansas City, Missouri. This tragic incident resulted in the loss of 114 lives and 200 injuries and is the most serious structural engineering failure in United States history. Out of this tragedy a number of serious ethical issues arose for the engineering profession. In this webinar you will learn about the structural design feature that was the nexus of the failure, and the organizational and procedural deficiencies that allowed the fatal design change to be implemented. You will learn about the ensuing technical investigation, the issues of responsibility and liability, and lessons that were learned that can help us prevent future tragic failures such as this one. This Webinar is intended for engineers, architects and other design and construction professionals wanting to learn how the most tragic structural failure in United States history resulted from organizational and procedural failures in the building design and construction process. Please note: this "Live & Interactive" ethics webinar is intended to fulfill the annual ethics course requirements for most professional certifications and registrations.
Date: Wednesday November 2. 2 - 4 pm ET Credits: 2 PDH Units
Learning Objectives
At the successful conclusion of this course, you’ll be able to identify and discuss:- Learn how the parties to the design and construction effort held themselves out to the public.
- Learn from file photos what investigators at the scene saw at the time.
- Learn about the technical investigation headed by the National Bureau of Standards.
- Learn about the investigation and conclusions reach by the Missouri engineering registration board.
- Learn how engineering societies reacted to the event.
- Learn how contemporary project delivery methods might lead to different conclusions about responsibility today.
- Learn the three essentials to guard against a recurrence of this type of tragedy in the future.
The seminar content and presentation were very engaging and excellent. I gave 4 stars because I was hoping to have a group discussion at the end moderated by the speaker.
The course was interesting and effectively pointed out ethical problems with the way many design and construction projects are run that lead to safety problems.
Good presentation. Would have like to have the presenter respond to some of the comments left in the Chat Room.
Many of Mr. Guyan’s comments were unprofessional and slanderous against others in the engineering profession, something which the profession doesn’t tolerate. His review was not unbiased but very jaundiced. There were comments and assertions made that were presented as factors in the failure when they clearly were not. Assertions about the ceiling failure during construction had nothing to do with the failure. He tried to say they and other issues were not but numerous repetitions about them led the listener to receive a confusing message. Yes there were some errors in Gillums’ design, however, they were not the cause of the failure. The walkways would still be standing today if Gillum’s design had been built. While not very constructible, the steel detailer could have developed better ways of accomplishing Gillum’s design that what they ended up designing. The steel detailer and fabricator made a significant change that was the cause of the failure. They failed miserably. Structural engineers review, but do not typically approve, shop drawings. Yes they could have caught the issue at review, but they were not the ones who created the error that cost of lives of over 100 people. Also, all projects have budget and time pressures, and numerous consultants, subconsultants, contractors, and subcontractors so this project was no different every other project that gets built and doesn’t fail. As someone who does forensic analyses, I was highly disappointed in the presentation and have concerns about listeners who got many wrong messages.
Very good
I learned a lot about the walkway collapse. The failure was caused by more than just the design change of the rods.
Tech problems at the end but overall good course.
Interesting and thorough report. The more experienced eyes on a project, the better the outcome.
Tech problems at the end were disappointing.
Please send power point slides bc I did not have time to read them all on the screen during the presentation.
We had some technical issues but overall it was a well planned and informed webinar. It shed some light on topics and concerns that are normally not thought about.
This was an interesting topic that was presented in a well-organized and logical manner. The presenter was clear and the narrative he weaved was easy to follow despite the complexity and number of parties involved in the incident.