Getting Lucky

By Sportsman, on January 23rd, 2008

Some days, common sense prevails, and it’s gratifying when hindsight confirms the correct choice was made..

Yesterday, I had full intentions on riding the crossbike home from work. I’ve worked out the details, stocked up on protective masks to prevent cow dust from lodging in my lungs, undoubtedly leading to brown lung. I can leave the company car at the office, commute back and forth with a vehicle at either location in case something comes up. Bako is expecting rain this week, so I have the requisite gear, bike has fenders. All was good.

Until the wind picked up. Granted, it would’ve been a tailwind, and I would have been spun out on the 48×11 top gear of the Morgul B. But the dust, and sand, were intimidating. I’m sure that had I placed my bike outside the office, sandblasting would’ve been complete and I could’ve sent it straight to some powdercoaters for a new look; but I like my jack-o-lantern bike. So, I wussed and drove home, watching tumbleweeds overtake my car at 60 mph.

This morning, back at the office, I was greeted with more evidence that i made the right decision..

New tanks, under construction, 90%+ completed..

January 24, 2008 at 7:46 am

Whoa, that’s not good!

slowerthensnot

January 24, 2008 at 6:14 pm

Damn thats gotta be 1/2 steel at least!

Man!

Matt

January 25, 2008 at 10:28 pm

As a former engineer for the insurance industry I can only tell you that this suprisingly this is not uncommon. I think the best one that I know of though came at a bridge over pass on an interstate that was being built. Friday afternoon – two cranes attached at either end of a huge I-beam lifted up the beam and set it up on the bridge supports. Since it was Friday and everyone wanted to go home, no fastening was done…..and well winds picked up over the weekend…and the cranes were still attached. The I-beam fell over and pulled the cranes down with them…………but one top of all thuis carnage, there was a thrid crane on site, and the I-beam fell right on top of that one.

Needless to say the CM was looking for a new job that following Monday.

Google the tower crane collapse on a bus in Seattle too…maybe there is a Youtube of that out by now.

January 25, 2008 at 10:37 pm

Could not find the Seattle collapse on the bus….but here is a Tacoma Bridge failure that is legendary….. look at this one!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-zczJXSxnw

Geeks of the world this thread is officiallly hijacked.

January 25, 2008 at 11:11 pm

Greatest structural failure ever….

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-u0zYkZYxWs&feature=related

Brendan

January 27, 2008 at 6:35 pm

I read about the Tacoma Bridge Collapse a while back in a book “To Engineer is Human,” which details the role of human error in structural, mechanical, and civil engineering pursuits.

Pretty darned fun book to read too, discussing the bridge, DC-10 #2 engine mounts, and some other high profile failures. Good book!

ssportsm

January 27, 2008 at 7:21 pm

cool Matt, thanks for the links..

One of the tanks was deemed “repairable”, and they (contractors are building the tanks, so they’re not mine yet) had it back in near-round condition by the end of the day Friday. fools. as I can testify after yesterday’s ride, the winds this weekend have been much worse than they were last week. so, this morning, I received an expected e-mail, tank collapsed again. I’ll post up some pix tomorrow..

January 28, 2008 at 7:31 pm

Not repairable. Elastic deformation through accident means that any deflection was lost once load (wind in this case) was removed. Wind load placed steel shell in plastic deformation, and another load was neeed to return the tank to intended shape. Sounds like everything is ok? Well, no – there are now weakend points in the structure, and perhaps small fractures in the structure – the metal needs to be scrapped. Period, end of story…sorry Mr. Nice Contractor Man…… time to get your insurance company involved because there ain;t no salvage here!

Grr…..

MattG

February 6, 2008 at 3:17 pm

Beautiful deformation. Too bad it wasn’t intentional

February 10, 2008 at 9:30 pm

MattG..Not to many people around here find that deformation to be beautifull.

Matt.. The approach being used is to remove and replace all of the deformed steel. I have a few more pix to add. they started working on it, and then another weekend of wind collapsed them again (haven’t they ever hear of weather sites? I knew it was going to be windy). Weather has settled down now, so they’re back at it. They’re still going to have problems, and they’ll have to be perfect for us to accept them..