Hyatt Regency Hotel
Kansas Collapse
Group 3
John Norris
Johnny Clarke
Simon Jones
Brían Cooney
Background
• 114 People killed & 200+ Injured
• Erected July 1980, one year later----DISASTER!
• On Friday evening 17th July 1981 at a dance
contest two footbridges contained in the
multi-storey atrium tragically failed
• The disaster has been attributed to a late
change in the design. An act ominously
feared by engineers
• At the time of collapse this catastrophe was
the worst recorded in the US
Technical Analysis of Failure
• The two walkways were suspended from a set of tie rods, the 2nd
floor walkway was hanging directly under the 4th floor walkway
• Walkways were intended to be supported by 3 crossbeams
suspended from 3 steel rods. The 3 rods were supposed to run all
the way from the 2nd floor to ceiling passing through the 4th floor
walkway.
• The steel company indicated a design change requirement- the
proposed threaded rods were to be substituted with two rods and
the 2nd floor walkway would now be supported by the 4th floor box
beam
• Calculations for the new design were not carried out by the
engineers and the new design was illegally implemented without
proper analysis of its structural integrity
The Design Change
The original design was to have the
threaded rods running through the
beam on the second and third level
walkways as shown in diagram on
right.
Due to the aesthetics of having
threads all along the rods, the steel
company decided to use shorter
separated rods and join them as
shown on left.
What went wrong??
•
•
•
•
Load on the beams on the forth floor
was doubled due to the rods being
shorter
The new design could barely handle
the dead load weight of the structure
itself and with the imposed load of
all the spectators added- the box
beam crumbled
The nut and washer at the end of
the beams tore through the beam
causing the walkways to collapse
The picture shows the beam where
the rod tore through it
The Consequences
• 114 people were killed and more than 200
injured
• The engineers that signed off the design lost
their licences in both Missouri and Texas
• $140 million was paid in compensation to the
families of the victims
• 1000s of people were affected by the negligence
of a small company of engineers
Conclusions
• This atrocity shows the importance that
the proper construction codes and ethics
are adhered to strictly
• Engineers have a duty to carry out their
jobs in a professional way. Incompetent
actions can have huge ramifications on
large amounts of people