Summary of Mega Disasters - Hyatt Regency Skywalk Collapse

00:00:00 - 00:45:00

The Hyatt Regency Skywalk collapsed in 2008, killing 114 people. The collapse was caused by a design flaw in the walkways' connection points, and the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and the Missouri State Board investigated Jack Gilliam's role. Gilliam was the chief engineer responsible for the walkways, and he had the opportunity to avert the collapse when part of the atrium ceiling collapsed during the build. GCE was later responsible for the collapse and Gilliam was suspended after five years of litigation.

• 00:00:00 The Hyatt Regency Skywalk collapsed 17 months after it opened, killing 1500 people. The collapse is a result of improperly installed bolts, and local engineer Jack Gilliam concludes that it was a one-off accident.
• 00:05:00 A popular Foxtrot song starts up at the Hyatt Regency, and a dance competition begins. Mike Mahoney's crew films a top shot from the first floor restaurant on the first floor skywalk, Walter and Shirley True Blood sway to the music booming up from the atrium nine meters above them. Dozens more watch from the third floor sky board on the lobby floor directly under the sky walks. Frank Freeman and Roger Triggers feet admire the competitors moves. A reporter Mike Mahoney is filming the tea dance in Kansas City when he hears a sharp metallic pop, and the floor drops about six to eight inches. He takes Shirley's arm and says they ought to step off, and they take about three steps before the noise to the skywalk opposite him registers. He's directly on level with the second walkway and the second walkway begins to sag and it takes just a few seconds but it seems like forever at the moment. At the moment of the collapse, dozens of people are watching Hara as the first and third floor glass and concrete skywars plummet into the crowded Lobby. The upper level comes down and the whole thing goes down as an elevator. Frank Freeman looks down and sees dozens of dunces and spectators my dad crushed beneath 65 tons of concrete
• 00:10:00 After the Hyatt Regency Skywalk collapsed, emergency personnel arrived and quickly set up a makeshift morgue in the hotel lobby. Outside the turn the hotel's taxi right into a treatment center, in his concrete tomb, Walther True Blood has no idea if his wife Shirley is alive. Then he hears something - possibly Shirley - and starts to cry. He remembers telling her that he was "almost there" and recalls feeling relieved when the water levels started to fall and the rescue workers began to lift the beam that was pinning Shelly to the floor. Finally, at 2:30 a.m., rescuers are able to free Paul and Frank from the rubble and take them to a nearby hospital. Seven and a half hours after the collapse, only dead bodies are being found andWalter and Shelly True Blood are still alive, but buried so deep that they can't even hear the workmen above them.
• 00:15:00 A walkway in a Hyatt Regency Hotel in Kansas City, Missouri collapsed, causing 114 deaths and 186 injuries. Firefighter Ray Wind pulls Marc Williams from the debris almost ten hours after the collapse, and he is the last person found alive. He is horribly injured and has broken back and kidneys, but is conscious. The family of the victims wants an independent inquiry into the disaster, but the local newspaper decides to shortcut the process and asks the National Bureau of Standards to help.
• 00:20:00 The Hyatt Regency Skywalk collapse left behind evidence that points to poor construction and faulty materials, which may have led to the collapse. Lishka, a Kansas City local structural engineer, was hired by the building's owners to investigate the disaster, but was met with resistance from the building's owners. Lishka discovered that the walkways had been removed, which prevented him from examining the wreckage more closely. The lead investigator for the National Bureau of Standards, Dr. Edward Frank, petitioned the Circuit Court of Jackson County for access to the wreckage, but was met with a denial. If the Court denies Frank's request, the independent investigation into the collapse is dead in the water.
• 00:25:00 The National Building and Safety Standards team starts to examine eyewitness accounts for clues to the cause of the collapse of the Hyatt Regency Skywalk in Kansas City. Many say that the Hyatt walkways were overcrowded that evening, and even encouraged people to dance in the walkways. Experts say that people who dancing on the walkways may have put them under unforeseen stress, and as a result, the walkway collapsed. However, Hyatt president Pat Foley rebuts the claim that the walkways were overloaded, and the collapse was caused by people dancing. The National Building and Safety Standards team examined Kansas City's building codes and found that the walkways should have been strong enough to carry at least 1280 people, but no one knows exactly how many people had held that evening. Investigators then get a break when they learn of Mike Mahoney's unique footage of the tea dance on the night of the disaster. They discovered that several of Mahoney's shots focus on the famous sky walks, and it is like being given that information on a silver platter. Investigators work out that at the time of the collapse, there were 40 people on the first floor walkway and 23 on the third floor walkway, 63 in total. They calculate that 63 people would only exert
• 00:30:00 The investigators found that the box beams connecting the upper and lower walkways at the Hyatt Regency Skywalk collapsed due to failure in the connection points, and that the design was flawed.
• 00:35:00 Investigators in Gaithersburg, Maryland attach steel beams to hanger rods to make exact replicas of the connection point between the walkways and the beams. They then calculate the total weight of the walkways and walkway connection, and find that the connection point was not able to support the weight. The investigation reveals that the walkways were not strong enough and had one-third the load capacity required by building codes at the time. This disaster could have been prevented if the connection point was stronger.
• 00:40:00 A hundred and fourteen people died when the Hyatt Regency Skywalk collapsed in Kansas City, Missouri, in 2008. The collapse was caused by a design flaw in the walkways' connection points, and the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) and the Missouri State Board investigated Jack Gilliam's role. It emerged that Gilliam was the chief engineer responsible for the walkways, and he had the opportunity to avert the collapse when part of the atrium ceiling collapsed during the build. GCE was later responsible for the collapse and Gilliam was suspended after five years of litigation. He accepts responsibility for the mistake, but insists that it's custom and practice in Missouri for the fabricator to do the calculations. Mark Williams, who spent two months in intensive care and endured many months more of painful rehabilitation, made a complete recovery.
• 00:45:00 Following a skywalk collapse in Kansas City, the city overhauled its building regulations requiring that all load-bearing calculations be checked by an engineer appointed by the city. The American Society of Civil Engineers also rewrote its rules to send a clear message to structural engineers.