- hace 3 horas
Hotel New World, a one-star budget hotel located in Singapore's Little India district, collapses due to growing microcracks in the failing structural columns. The cracks were caused by a miscalculation of the building's structural load by the structural engineer. After a seven-day rescue operation, 17 people are saved, but 33 perish.
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00:00Singapore
00:03Famed throughout Asia for its order and calm efficiency
00:07Then, suddenly, one Saturday morning
00:09Disaster stops the entire country in its tracks
00:15A six-story hotel crashes to the ground in under 60 seconds
00:2133 people die, and 17 more are buried alive
00:25Trapped beneath thousands of tons of steel, glass and concrete
00:30It's the worst collapse in the country's history
00:33And it leaves investigators baffled
00:35Now, using advanced computer simulations
00:38We reveal exactly what caused the tragedy
00:43Disasters don't just happen, they're a chain of critical events
00:48Unravel the clues and count down those final seconds from disasters
01:03Asia, Singapore
01:06Over four million people live crammed in a country the size of New York City
01:11It's a dynamic, vibrant place
01:14That attracts people from all over the region and beyond
01:17Striving to make a better life for themselves in this English-speaking island of opportunity
01:25Downtown, tower blocks soar into the sky as architects struggle to maximize the limited space
01:34Much of it, land reclaimed from swamp and sea
01:41Even below ground, the city is teeming with activity as Singapore expands at breathtaking pace
01:52Giant tunnels are bored by teams of engineers from all over the world
01:56Working on a new subway system that will connect the high-rise area with older and less prosperous districts like
02:02this one, Little India
02:05Six kilometers from downtown, this area is home to the manual laborers who support the booming economy
02:12Here on Owen Road stands the Hotel New World, built in 1971
02:17The building is unremarkable
02:20Thirty-six reinforced concrete columns supporting six concrete floors
02:26There's a car park in the basement
02:27The local branch of the bank takes up the ground floor
02:31Above that is a popular nightclub
02:34And a budget hotel occupies the rest of the building
02:37As is usual in this hot climate, air conditioning units and water tanks are installed on the roof
02:45At over 24 meters, it's small by Singapore standards
02:48But one of the tallest buildings in Little India
02:53The building has led an untroubled life, apart from one serious incident
02:59In 1975, when a gas leak poisoned 35 people
03:07Everybody made a full recovery
03:10And the building was given a clean bill of health
03:15March 14th, 1986, 11 years later
03:22It's a Friday night, and as usual, Madame Lily Teo, the nightclub hostess, sets up the first-floor bar
03:28In preparation for a busy evening, expecting the usual mix of businessmen and couples who visit her club
03:49She's startled to see that a column on the dance floor has cracked
03:57The time is 7pm
04:00She decides to inform the building's owner
04:04Shortly afterwards, with the nightclub now open, a couple of workmen start repairing the damage
04:11No one pays much attention to them
04:17By 9.15pm, the club is in full swing
04:21In the staff dressing room, one of the girls checks her makeup
04:37In Singapore, like most countries around the world, a broken mirror is a symbol of bad luck
04:47But it's the end of the working week
04:48But it's the end of the working week
04:48And everyone in the nightclub is too busy having a good time to worry about silly superstitions
04:59The next morning
05:01Saturday, March 15th
05:05A.M.
05:11Xiong Cheng Guan
05:12Xiong Cheng Guan, assistant manager of the ground-floor bank
05:14Walks through the park with his childhood sweetheart
05:17They were married three months ago
05:19But he's been working so hard, they haven't had time for their honeymoon yet
05:27we're happily married and we actually planned a trip to Australia and New Zealand
05:31as John leaves for work he says goodbye to his wife Leon CC knowing it's a big
05:37day for her she's taking an important exam I was having my final exam for
05:45diploma John and I had planned to meet in the afternoon as it's a Saturday the
05:50bank will close at lunchtime and a couple are planning on spending the rest of
05:54the day walking hand-in-hand through Singapore's busy streets I was looking
05:59forward to Saturday afternoon after work and then usually we will go out 17
06:06people work in the bank it's a close friendly team as is common in Singapore
06:13they take great pride in providing their customers with efficient service
06:2121 year old Christina for has been working at the bank for just three
06:25months this is my first job in the bank and I enjoy it very much Christina has
06:33never been up to the nightclub on the floor above but she's sitting almost
06:38directly below the column on the dance floor that cracked the night before
06:5110 10 a.m. a customer comes into the bank she's out of breath saying there's a
06:58problem in the basement car park debris is falling down the customer for us that the
07:03bank is going to collapse John stays in the bank whilst Christina and a colleague rush down to the basement
07:10to
07:18investigate
07:18although none of the cars are damaged as they're leaving they see two men in
07:23overalls working by a cracked column
07:27there's debris on the floor but the workmen say everything is fine reassured that
07:34it's nothing serious they go back to work in the ground floor bank
07:45two floors above and the hotel reception staff see cracks and fissures spreading across the wall
07:54but down below
07:55chiong and Christina are unaware of any further problems
08:06throughout
08:07throughout the building vital supporting walls and pillars are starting to fracture the hotel new world is on the brink
08:14of collapse
08:18something extraordinary is happening within an unremarkable building in Singapore's little India
08:25cracks are spreading throughout the walls and supporting columns
08:31but in the bank on the ground floor assistant manager chiong is oblivious
08:35he's wondering how his wife Cece has done in her exam
08:39I wanted to see how she fell during the exam
08:43it's 11 22 am
08:46further back Christina is finishing off the week's work
08:50when she's startled by a sound
08:53it's falling debris
08:55I actually did not know what's happening
08:59and now she starts to feel vibrations all around her
09:03we can feel the floor shaking
09:0711 26 am
09:09now the whole building is starting to shake uncontrollably
09:17pillars are cracking
09:20walls are giving way
09:26an unstoppable catastrophic collapse is set in motion
09:32it was very sudden
09:34one instant you are working
09:36the next instant it is all pitch dark
09:39thousands of tons of steel reinforced concrete rain down on the people inside
09:50in one terrifying minute
09:52the hotel New World suffers total structural failure
10:01trapping dozens of people
10:11what was once a local landmark and a place of work
10:14is now just a huge mound of rubble
10:17surrounded by an enormous cloud of dust
10:19visible for kilometres around
10:26all six stories of the building have been destroyed
10:29transformed into a concrete tomb
10:32Christina chiong and other bank staff
10:35are buried at the very bottom of the building rubble
10:37in the pitch black basement car park
10:41we couldn't see anything
10:43we couldn't hear anything
10:44we couldn't even see the
10:46our hand
10:48chiong can't see his colleague Christina
10:50even though she's just a metre or two away
10:52pinned down by massive concrete slabs
10:55I was just like laying in the coffin
10:58I couldn't move at all
11:04back on the surface
11:05it's a scene of total devastation
11:11news crews film local people frantically clambering onto the wreckage
11:17they furiously manhandle rubble
11:20they furiously manhandle rubble
11:20desperately searching for any survivors
11:3011 35 a.m. within eight minutes emergency workers start arriving
11:42Singapore's top military medic
11:44Dr. Lim Menkin rushes to help
11:47he's stunned by the scale of this unprecedented catastrophe
11:52this is the biggest disaster since World War II
11:56the terrible news is spreading to grief-stricken relatives
11:59who mingle amongst the crowds of stunned onlookers
12:04it's a scene of total bewilderment and rising dread
12:11around noon
12:12over half an hour into the disaster
12:14chiong's wife cc arrives and realizes that her husband is buried
12:18somewhere inside the mountain of rubble
12:21she has no way of knowing whether he's dead or alive
12:26she finds her uncle who happens to be a structural engineer
12:29but he can offer her no real comfort
12:32i remember asking him what are the chances of chiong surviving in such a collapse
12:39he told me we should just hope for the best
12:42about 10 meters from cc below the rubble
12:46the husband chiong is fighting off the panic
12:48but all around other survivors like his colleague christina
12:52are aware of mounting hysteria
12:54i can hear a lot of people crying
12:57it was asking for help
12:59some of them was screaming
13:00and some of them was crying in pain
13:05some of the survivors are badly injured
13:08but assistant manager chiong
13:10is determined to keep everyone calm
13:15i thought it's a matter of time people will come to rescue us
13:2812.30 pm
13:30about one hour after the collapse
13:32back on the surface
13:33there's good news
13:34the rescue teams find a survivor
13:36a tourist
13:37who is staying on the top floors of the hotel
13:43shortly afterwards they haul a second survivor
13:46a local shopkeeper from the hotel debris
13:53the rescuers hastily put together a list of all those known to have been in the building when it collapsed
13:59they can account for everyone known to have been in the hotel on the top four floors
14:0617 are dead and 11 have been rescued alive
14:12the nightclub on the floor below was empty
14:15but the ground floor bank is a different matter
14:19their list reveals that up to 20 people
14:22including chiong and christina
14:23were working there when the building collapsed
14:25and will be buried at the very bottom of the rubble
14:3511.30 pm
14:3812 hours after the disaster
14:41the rescue teams are working through the night trying to reach the bank
14:47heavy machinery hauls huge slabs of debris away from the top
14:55but the rubble is very unstable and shifts dangerously
15:04some 10 meters below the glare of the rescuers arc lights
15:07with vibrations shaking the wreckage
15:10the horror is growing
15:13the survivors are trapped in a dark tomb
15:16under 6,000 tons of concrete and steel
15:23assistant manager chiong is just within reach of one of his bank colleagues
15:27who's lying injured nearby crushed by a beam
15:30he tries desperately to push the beam away
15:34but it's too heavy
15:35i felt very helpless
15:37your colleagues here dying and then you can't do anything at all
15:42that was bad
15:48chiong realises his efforts are in vain
15:52you could smell the stench of death
15:56it's very sad
15:58your own colleague you have been working for so many years with
16:01and all of a sudden he's gone
16:04the crushed masonry is preventing the circulation of air
16:08oxygen is beginning to run out
16:14just a meter or two from chiong
16:16christina is becoming desperate
16:18i was thinking i'm still very young
16:20i still got lots of things to do
16:23and i'm not married yet
16:25i can't just die like that
16:33back on the surface
16:34the rescuers still have 10 meters of rubble to dig through
16:40at this rate it'll take days to reach chiong and christina
16:44with the oxygen getting thinner
16:46this is time they just don't have
16:54midnight
16:57half a day has passed since the collapse of singapore's hotel new world building
17:03only eleven people have been pulled alive from the rubble
17:09christina and chiong are trapped deep in the basement car park
17:19a team of irish engineers working on the nearby subway construction
17:23is watching the rescue
17:25tunneller tommy gallagher is especially concerned
17:28that the use of heavy machinery may be causing the rubble to shift and fall
17:32potentially endangering the lives of any survivors buried at the very bottom of the mound
17:38we kept saying to the senior people in charge
17:40we think there is people in that building alive
17:43and what you're doing here
17:45you're going to kill them
17:46they propose a radical alternative
17:50abandoning the use of cranes to clear the rubble from the top
17:52and instead tunneling deep into the foundations of the building to get survivors out
18:00it's a very difficult decision
18:02but around dawn the authorities give the green light to tommy and his colleagues
18:09the irish engineers have no idea exactly where in the basement any survivors may be
18:16after close examination of the building plans they decide the quickest way to get into the car park
18:21is to break through ventilation shafts accessible from street level
18:27a rescue camera reveals a scene of devastation
18:31the tunnelers have to wade through knee deep water and push past crushed cars
18:37to their horror they can smell petrol
18:42they know a single spark could set up a devastating explosion
18:47the car park is a death trap
18:50that's what we were worried about
18:52any spark of a machine ring would
18:57the subway engineers have an agonizing wait whilst the water and petrol are pumped out
19:06then they start hacking a makeshift tunnel through the debris
19:10using small hydraulic jacks to support the thousands of tons of rubble above
19:26the ground so unstable above us everything we were just taking a chance like
19:30then their worst fears are realized
19:44the tunnel caves in
19:46tommy and his mates scramble out moments before the roof collapses
19:50their path is totally blocked
19:58sunday 7.30pm
20:04jiong and christina have been buried in the stifling claustrophobic darkness for 32 hours
20:09they have no idea rescuers are trying to reach them
20:14undeterred by the cave-in the irish engineers start digging more tunnels in the dangerous building rubble
20:20willingly risking their lives
20:23the tunnelers were the bravest people i've ever met in my life
20:26and the way they went about it
20:28the spirit is a spirit that's very rare
20:31really
20:34tunnels two and three are built from the southeast
20:37but the subway engineers soon find their path blocked by huge slabs of debris
20:42with tunnel one still too dangerous after the cabin
20:45a fourth tunnel is dug northwards
20:47it takes all night
20:49but tommy and his mates crawl under crushed cars
20:51and dig all the way around the exterior basement wall
20:54we walked around the clock
20:56we never went to bed
21:01Monday at 7am
21:03chiong and christina have been trapped in the rubble for almost two days
21:07they're losing track of time
21:10we don't even know how many days we were trapped inside
21:13i was just trying to keep alive
21:16because i have a lot of things to live for
21:20then chiong hears a noise
21:22we could hear rumbling sounds you know from the distance
21:29hoping that it's a rescue team
21:31the bankers start tapping frantically on the beams that are trapping them
21:43the bankers start tapping frantically on the beams that are trapping them
21:45hello i'm here
21:48i'm here
21:50where
21:50i'm here
21:52i'm coming against you
21:54we was very happy
21:56didn't know where we are
21:58the tunnelers crawl ever closer to chiong and christina
22:02they feel they're on the verge of reaching them
22:05but they face one last obstacle
22:08and all of a sudden we had a meter square concrete beam
22:11and it was right in front of us we're headed smack on
22:13so they were on the other side of that
22:17they have no idea where in the building the beam came from
22:21but they're desperately concerned that it's helping to support the weight of the collapsed building above them
22:296,000 tons of rubble are balanced delicately above the heads of christina, chiong
22:34and now the tunnels
22:39it's noon on monday
22:41two days into the disaster
22:44the rescue workers decide they have no choice except to break through the huge concrete beam
22:50Dr. Lim joins them ready for any emergency
22:53you don't think of the danger
22:55there's somebody at the end of the tunnel and you want to reach that person
22:59the tunneller's drills carve through the concrete surprisingly fast
23:05a few meters away in the darkness chiong hears the drilling getting louder
23:14they keep asking me can you see a light, can you see a light
23:21finally I could see and there's a chink of light from somewhere
23:27soon, chiong is able to see the rescuers just the other side of the hole
23:32the tunnelers are terrified that they may have cut through a major supporting beam
23:36they fear the rubble could come crashing down at any moment
23:40they tell chiong to stay where he is whilst they prop up the route
23:44i said no thank you i'm coming out
23:47chiong cannot bear to stay another moment in the darkness
23:49he scrambles towards safety
23:53he just ran
23:55and i said don't blame me either because he thought he would never come out of there alive either
24:05after two days buried alive chiong is able to walk out into the daylight with just a few scratches
24:12that was really a miracle
24:15Christina is buried deeper in the rubble
24:17it takes another seven hours to rescue her
24:27Dr Lim leads Christina away on a stretcher
24:31later examinations reveal her only injury is a black eye
24:35i feel just like a hero or something like that
24:46Chiong and his wife Cece are finally reunited at the hospital
24:51it was such a moment of joy, such great joy
24:56you just feel that life is very fragile
24:59any time we can be taken away from you
25:01you just, just live, live
25:05thanks to the pioneering use of tunnels to dig into the very deepest parts of the rubble
25:09six more survivors are ultimately pulled alive from the wreck of hotel new world
25:16in all 17 people have been saved
25:22but 33 have lost their lives
25:29now by rewinding the events of that fateful day
25:32and by going deep into the investigation
25:34we can reveal what really happened to the hotel new world
25:38advanced computer simulation will take us where no camera can go
25:43into the heart of the disaster zone
25:46a commission of inquiry will be appointed
25:49to seek answers to the many questions
25:52raised in this, the worst building disaster in Singapore
25:56the investigation team includes Terry Hume
25:59a structural engineer based in Singapore
26:02he has decades of experience in major building construction
26:06Hume visits the site within hours of the collapse
26:09and is shocked by what he sees
26:12the first impression was that the whole collapse
26:14must have been very rapid
26:17and the whole building must have collapsed at the same time
26:20it was clearly something unusual
26:24in a city like Singapore
26:26it's everyone's worst nightmare
26:29similar buildings are everywhere
26:30and much taller structures
26:32soar skywards all across the island
26:35the investigators need to find out
26:38why the hotel new world collapsed
26:40and fast
26:46how did a six story reinforced concrete building collapse
26:50in fewer than 60 seconds
26:53until the investigators find out
26:55the lives of millions who live and work in similar structures
26:58throughout Singapore
27:00could be at risk
27:02the team interviews locals
27:04who remember that 10 years earlier
27:06a gas leak knocked out 35 people at the hotel site
27:12could gas have escaped again causing an explosion
27:15or worse
27:17could there have been a bomb
27:26it's investigator Terry Hume's first hunch
27:29he knows that explosions leave telltale signs
27:32what the experts call a distinctive signature
27:35the immediate effect of the explosion
27:37is normally to certainly blow out the windows
27:40possibly blow out the sidewalk
27:45you would see some sort of
27:48evidence of this explosion blowing the debris out
27:51or window shattered
27:58but the unique marks of an explosion
28:01shattered glass and crushed rubble
28:03blown hundreds of meters from the disaster site
28:05simply do not exist
28:08so if it wasn't an explosion
28:10what could have caused the collapse
28:13it really is quite difficult to demolish a complete building
28:16very neatly
28:17the team needs to investigate the disturbing possibility
28:20that the building materials were defective
28:23this is the wall here
28:24they interview the Irish tunnelers
28:26and learn that some of the concrete was so soft
28:28their drills went through it like butter
28:33could it be that the concrete was badly mixed in the first place?
28:36undermining the strength of the building
28:39with millions of lives depending on similar materials throughout the city
28:43it's an horrific thought
28:45the team takes 240 concrete core samples
28:49to one of Singapore's top laboratories
28:52of these 80 are quickly dismissed as being unusable
28:56unsuitable for testing
28:59the scientists examine the remaining 160 cores
29:02to see whether the correct ratio of sand, stones and cement was used
29:07then they perform concrete strength tests on them
29:17the cores do fracture
29:19but only under very heavy loads
29:21the materials they test meet internationally accepted safety standards
29:26it was a disappointment because that was the easy solution
29:29if the concrete had been poor quality
29:31you'd have immediately had an answer to why it collapsed
29:35Hume concludes the reason the concrete seemed soft
29:38was because it was fractured during the violence of the collapse itself
29:45so if it isn't defective building materials
29:47what else could have caused the disaster?
29:50the investigators turn to another terrifying scenario
29:54one that like the concrete could have implications for the entire city
30:00they look at the land on which the hotel was built
30:02and discover like much of Singapore
30:05it used to be a swampy flood plain
30:07drained from the 19th century onwards
30:10this was fine for the construction of small buildings
30:12but like much of the booming city
30:14the Hotel New World was significantly taller
30:17bigger than anything built a hundred years ago
30:20if the reclaimed ground was unstable
30:22could the collapse be just the beginning of an island-wide disaster?
30:32the first step is for the investigators to examine the surviving basement walls
30:39if the foundations had moved in the unstable ground
30:42these should show evidence of catastrophic cracks
30:49intriguingly they find nothing
30:52to make sure they analyze the composition of the soil
30:58the team drilled deep into the ground to take samples
31:06leaving nothing to chance
31:07they also test the strength of parts of the foundations that survived
31:16finally, after weeks of work, the results come through
31:26although there was evidence of some small ground movements
31:29the team is forced to conclude
31:31that it was not enough to have brought down the building
31:33it became clear that there hadn't been a failure in the foundations
31:37they were quite reasonably well constructed
31:40with yet another avenue closed
31:43the team turned their gaze even further underground
31:47could the construction of Singapore's new subway
31:50have weakened the building's foundations and caused it to collapse?
31:56when you build an underground railway in any town
31:58anything that goes wrong
32:00is immediately laid to the blame for the underground railway
32:06could the subway tunnelers be responsible for the disaster itself?
32:11there was a bit of a kick in the taste to it really, yeah
32:14the investigators quickly established
32:16that the closer of two nearby subway tunnels
32:19is less than a kilometre away
32:21what effect could this have had on the building?
32:30subway tunnels have collapsed before
32:33just a year earlier in South Korea
32:35this building fell into one
32:42it only happened because the building was almost directly above the tunnel
32:47but could there be an unknown mechanism by which the subway was responsible?
32:53the Singapore investigators measure the diameter of the tunnel
32:56and calculate the ground movements that vibrations would have caused
33:00even taking this into account, it seems an unlikely solution
33:06Professor Jonathan Wood is a world expert
33:08who studied the dynamics of building collapses for over 20 years
33:12if you are within two diameters of the tunnel
33:16you can expect quite an effect
33:19here they were hundreds of yards away
33:23the team concludes that the subway tunnels were simply not close enough to have been responsible for the collapse
33:32Tommy and the tunnelers are in the clear
33:35we knew it was something that happened, a freak accident, it was exactly what it was
33:43it's now clear that the collapse of the Hotel New World has not been caused by an explosion
33:50by shoddy construction
33:53by swampland
33:55or by subway tunneling
34:00but buildings don't just collapse
34:03it's like a murder investigation, you must find who is responsible
34:08the investigators know they must be missing a vital piece of evidence
34:15it soon arrives from a very unlikely source
34:21the nightclub
34:25the police interview the women who were working in the first floor club the night before the collapse
34:34the nightclub hostess tells them how, as she was setting up the bar
34:39a pillar on the dance floor cracked
34:46the investigators consult the building plans
34:48which show this is column 26 out of a total of 36
34:54they know that a failure of one supporting pillar
34:57should not have brought the entire building crashing down
35:02then they interview one of the girls who was working in the nightclub
35:08she tells them how she was checking her makeup in the dressing room
35:12when the mirror shattered
35:16the mirror was attached to another support pillar
35:20column 32
35:23the investigators now know that a second pillar was close to failure
35:32next, the team interviews survivor Christina Fuhr
35:36she tells them how, on the morning of the disaster
35:39she went down to the basement car park
35:41and saw workmen propping wood against the column
35:45the pillar had cracked and there was plaster on the floor
35:50they identified this as column 30
35:53and it was also failing
35:56it's a crucial breakthrough
35:57there are now eyewitness accounts that three columns were failing in the hours leading up to the disaster
36:04for the first time
36:05the investigators know that three vital supporting columns were stressed right to the limit
36:17there had to be something very badly wrong with the building
36:20but what could it be?
36:24as a last resort
36:25the team starts looking at cutting edge laboratory research
36:28into a little known phenomenon that could provide the answer
36:33when concrete is stressed to near breaking point
36:36tiny cracks can start spreading deep within the heart of the material
36:42not only are these micro cracks as they're called potentially deadly
36:47but frighteningly they're invisible to the naked eye
36:51you can only see them under a microscope
36:54it's impossible to know for sure
36:56whether the crucial supporting columns of the Hotel New World
36:59were suffering from this dangerous disease
37:02but if micro cracks are ignored
37:04they eventually cause the surface of pillars to fracture
37:09greatly reducing the amount of weight they can support
37:13at this point the building would be on the verge of collapse
37:18if the team is correct
37:19like worm eating away timber from within
37:22micro cracking would have weakened the concrete columns in the building
37:25until they were effectively rotten
37:33but where could the extra weight that causes micro cracking have come from?
37:41as the site is being cleared
37:43the investigators see massively heavy objects being pulled from the rubble
37:50they examine the blueprints
37:51to see whether these were allowed for in the original plans
37:55and make a startling discovery
37:58during the 15 years of its lifespan
38:00the building owner added extra loads to the Hotel New World
38:04that were not part of the original design
38:07the team learns that in 1975
38:10the bank built a steel reinforced strong room
38:12weighing 22 tons on the ground floor
38:22then in 1978
38:24the building owner installed two air conditioning towers
38:27adding extra weight
38:34in 1982
38:35to improve the building's lacklustre appearance
38:38workmen fixed heavy duty ceramic glazed tiles
38:41to the exterior walls
38:42the weight?
38:44over 50 tons
38:50finally in 1986
38:52before the collapse
38:53the building owner installed yet another air conditioning tower
38:56to make conditions in the sweltering Singapore heat
39:00more comfortable
39:09the investigators believe all this extra weight must have been too much to bear
39:15all modern buildings are designed to support what the experts call the dead load and the live load
39:22the dead load is the weight of the building itself
39:26but for the investigators the crucial calculation is the live load
39:30the extra weight consisting of people and objects
39:33ranging from air conditioning towers to furniture
39:36which a building has to support
39:41could the building support over 100 tons of extra live load placed upon it?
39:46the answer is a big surprise
39:50the calculation showed that the live load was adequately supported
39:55set against the 6,000 ton weight of the building itself
39:59the live load including over 100 tons of strong room, tiles and air conditioning units
40:04was insignificant
40:06it should not have caused the building's 36 pillars to give way
40:13the team is back at square one
40:19after months of painstaking work they still don't know what happened
40:30the team is certain they must have missed some vital clue
40:33that it will enable them to understand why Singapore's Hotel New World collapsed
40:37they return to the blueprints and pour over photos of the damaged columns again and again
40:46clutching at straws they double check the calculations made by the draftsmen
40:50for the weight of the building itself
40:51the dead load
40:57what they find is a revelation
40:59a fatal mistake that means for the entire 15 years after its construction
41:04the building was on the verge of catastrophe
41:10the amazing thing was basically this draft was allowed for the live load
41:15and he'd forgotten the dead load
41:16it's an astonishing discovery
41:19a schoolboy mistake
41:21the calculations made by the draftsmen were so badly wrong
41:25that key columns
41:28such as 26 and 32
41:30could not even support the weight of the building itself
41:34even without all the extra live load
41:37the air conditioning units
41:39heavy duty glazed tiles and bank strong room
41:42for 15 years many of the pillars that were supporting the building
41:46had been right at the limit of their strength
41:50the collapse was just a matter of time
41:56all the columns were very near failure
41:59had been sitting close to the edge for 15 years
42:03the investigators finally understand why the disaster happened
42:08now by rewinding the events leading up to that fateful day
42:11and by following the process of the extensive investigation
42:15we can finally reveal what really happened to the hotel new world
42:24friday march 14th 1986
42:29for 15 years hidden from human eyes
42:32deadly micro cracks were spreading deep within the concrete columns of the hotel new world
42:417pm
42:4216 hours before the collapse
42:47column 26 cracks in the nightclub
42:50it's weakening and starts to pass its load to surrounding pillars
42:57about 13 hours before disaster
43:00column 32 can't support the extra load and starts to fracture
43:05this causes a mirror attached to it to smash
43:10just over one hour from disaster
43:13load from the two nightclub columns is being transferred to column 30
43:17it starts cracking
43:19this time in the basement car park
43:30four minutes before disaster
43:33above christina column 26 starts to collapse
43:37causing debris to billow down and vibrations to spread throughout the bank
43:44as three columns collapse the building reaches the point of no return
43:49an unstoppable chain reaction is set in motion
43:54if you've got your pack of cards
43:55all you've got to do is knock one card out
43:58and all the other cards follow suit
44:06the entire building crashes to the ground in under 60 seconds
44:12killing 33 people
44:25tragically the investigators now know there were plenty of warnings that the hotel was about to collapse
44:32if the building owner had told the authorities that three columns were cracking
44:36instead of ordering workmen to patch them up
44:39disaster could easily have been averted
44:44I believe any structural engineer would have immediately said that you needed to evacuate the building
44:5133 lives could have been saved
45:03Survivors John and Christina will always remember their colleagues who died in the Hotel New World collapse
45:10I do miss all my colleagues
45:11they are the best that I ever have
45:15but they will also never forget the courage of the subway tunnels
45:22it was volunteering
45:24and they had to dig through debris which might just fall on them at any time
45:29without them I would not be here
45:32so I would like to thank them very much on this
45:39Tommy Gallagher and the subway tunnelers were awarded one of Singapore's highest peacetime honors
45:44a conspicuous gallantry medal
45:51Lessons have been learnt from the tragedy
45:54Singapore completely overhauled its building regulations
45:57to ensure that all dead and live load calculations made by architects would in future be independently checked
46:04a crucial extra safeguard that has been adopted by many other countries
46:10like many cities Singapore continues to build ever upwards
46:16mercifully building collapses are a rare event both in Singapore and throughout the world
46:25but when they happen the courage and dignity of ordinary people shine through
46:45moesten
46:46things are meant to rule
46:48there is no wonder
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