Big Dig Tunnel Thrill Ride

[Jamo]

Of course it was union workmanship...who turns the freeking bolts? Same problem arose in the rebuild of the Bay Bridge in Frisco...another union-demo town.

Doesn't matter who the general contractor is...forced to hire local union crews and subs per the union-friendly laws provided by the demo power base.

[wtm442]

Guess what? The method of using epoxy to hold bolts in concrete is not approved in California.

So all of you Kalifornicators can sleep easy ... when the next earthquake hits and you are driving your car .. head for the closest tunnel.

[Jamo]

The common theme, therefore, being union labor.

That project should be scrapped...use it as a sewer for all the demo-bs in Mass.

[wtm442]

Jamo
You cannot scrap a project that is finished.

Its just that now your taxes will be paying for all of the fixes and tremendous maintenance costs on our interstate highway, here in Taxxachusetts.

Bend over and say ahhhhhhhhhh

[Ron61]

Warren,

You mean they are going to fix that tunnel? I figured with all the brilliant politicians in power today they would find a place and dig a new tunnel. Oh, and instead of concrete, they shold use E-6000 glue to line it and hold it up. No complicated bolts to tighten and other engineering problems. And even Ted Kennedy could figure out how to squeeze glue out of a tube.

Ron

[Don]

From the Sunday Boston Globe:


Three bolts had no glue, Reilly says
By Sean P. Murphy, Globe Staff | July 16, 2006

Three of the bolts that were supposed to hold up the three-ton concrete panel that fell and killed a 38-year-old Jamaica Plain woman on Monday night have been found to have no epoxy on them, Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly said in an interview yesterday.

Reilly's investigation is focusing on whether the epoxy used in the tunnel failed , or if construction workers who installed the bolts misused or omitted the epoxy .

The epoxy, a high-strength glue, was used to bond the load-carrying bolts to the concrete roof in drilled holes.

``This is the most important evidence in terms of the investigation right now," said Reilly, who spent much of yesterday at the tunnel site after attending a memorial service for Melina Del Valle, who was killed in the ceiling collapse.

Reilly said that so far, investigators have found 19 of the 20 bolts that were supposed to have attached the concrete panel to the roof. He said the investigators are using the recovered evidence to ``recreate the positioning" of the panel in an area near the tunnel.

While some of the bolts appear to have no epoxy on them, others showed an uneven distribution of epoxy , Reilly said. Some of the bolts are bent, he said.

Reilly said last week as the investigation unfolded that the bolts that once anchored the panels slipped out cleanly, as the panels plummeted.

This suggested that the epoxy used had not bonded properly. His comments yesterday gave the most details yet concerning evidence that may illuminate the cause of the fatal incident.

After the accident, much of the construction debris was hauled out of the roadway, along with the car in which Del Valle was a passenger.

Del Valle's husband survived and climbed out of the vehicle. Reilly quickly opened a criminal investigation into Del Valle's death and since Tuesday has overseen the gathering of evidence.

Reilly said that while the epoxy is one focus of the investigation, the probe is much broader in scope and includes an examination of the design of the ceiling panel system.

DAVID LUBEROFF
The culture of stressing costs over safety
By David Luberoff | July 16, 2006

HOW COULD this happen?

How could a project once touted as one of the 21st century's engineering marvels have such fatal and seemingly obvious problems?

In coming weeks we'll learn more details about just what went wrong. But it's already clear that part of the problem was that for more than a decade public officials in charge of the Big Dig overemphasized concerns about the projects' costs and underemphasized the need to build a safe, well-built project.

That's not to say that they ignored concerns about safety and quality. Rather, they created a culture that was skeptical of -- and at times hostile to -- those who raised such concerns. As a result, seemingly minor problems were ignored. Usually this is not a problem, but sometimes this can lead to catastrophic results.

Why would the project's overseers underemphasize safety concerns? Because they fell victim to one of the iron laws of project management: ``Fast, good, or cheap? Pick two."

In absolute terms, the Big Dig was never ``cheap." But in the 1980s and early 1990s, it looked cheap to state officials and project supporters because they weren't using a lot of state or local taxes or tolls to pay for the Big Dig. Rather, they were planning to spend federal funds. This seemed logical because the Big Dig was an interstate highway and since 1956 the federal government had paid about 90 percent of the cost of any highway project that was part of the Interstate Highway System.

Things changed in the mid-1990s, however. Except for the Big Dig, the Interstate Highway System was done. The project's estimated costs continued to grow, which made it increasingly unpopular outside of Boston. The forces came to a head in 1998, when the Republican-controlled Congress refused to cover the bulk of the project's additional costs.

Now state officials had to use large amounts of local tax and toll revenues to pay for the project. As a result, local advocates of other highway and transit projects, not to mention other claimants for public funding, began to see the Big Dig as a competitor.

Moreover, the state's Republican governors were loath to increase taxes or tolls to cover the Big Dig's increased costs because they were touting their records as strong managers who could cut taxes without compromising services or public safety.

So the project's managers increasingly focused on ``cheap" and ``fast" and didn't worry as much about whether the project was ``good."

Several bloggers connected to the project confirm this shift. Friday18, for example, recalled that contractors working on the Zakim Bunker Hill Bridge were allowed to go ahead with substandard work even after her husband, who worked for a materials testing company, documented problems with the newly poured concrete. As a result, she notes, she had ``a distinct and utter lack of surprise" when she heard about Monday's tragedy.

This culture has to be fixed before we move forward not only with the Big Dig but with billions of dollars of other proposed highway and transit projects as well.

In the short run, we need to empower highly respected professionals to assess and repair the Big Dig's current woes.

In the long run, it means that senior officials should actively, systematically, and skeptically assess all projections about the estimated costs and benefits of any proposed new project.

To make that process as credible as possible, they should assume from the start that local taxpayers will pay at least half the cost of those projects and that, like anyone who hires a contractor, local taxpayers will be upset if projects have obvious flaws, costs are substantially higher than what they were told to expect, or projects do not provide promised benefits.

Doing so would help ensure that the Big Dig and the next generation of major projects are safe, well-built, and cost-effective. And that would mean that at least one small, good thing came out of Monday's horrible tragedy.

[Ron61]

Don,

Isn't that getting to be the way of things any more. Roofs falling, buildings and bridges falling, and when they start checking they find that kick backs, corrupt inspeectors and such are mostly to blame. Instead of using the type steel and such they were supposed to, they use a cheaper grade, the inspector gets a cut of the saved money, and everyone gets rich until a few years later when everything falls down. We had a fairly large bridge project in Redding several years ago and they spend millions on it. Three years later they had to close it and tear it down and build another one because chunks were falling out of it and it was unsafe to drive over. They found the cement was not even good, only about a third of the rebar that was called for was in and it was 1/4 inch instead of the 3/4 inch called for in the specs. Of course the original contractor and state inspector who signed off on it were not to be found as they had all left the state the year before. And on top of that, the original bridge had huge cost over runs that went into some ones pocket.

Ron

[Jamo]

Sounds like halfassed work by union workers who failed to do their jobs...like I said before.

Blame managers, costs, government, etc. all you want...it still comes down to fetherbedding a$$holes who neglected to do the job they were paid for when they installed the bolts.

They can name the person(s) who worked on that slab, but the union will protect them, and then they'll file a stress claim.

[Don]

There was another article earlier last week which mentioned the epoxy process, if I recall correctly:

1. On site, the resin and hardner material are forced/inserted into the drilled hole in the concrete at the same time.
2. The bolt is inserted and then tightned. The threads on the bolt, as it is tightned , mix the two substances together forming the epoxy .

Other Boston Globe comments:

Many more flaws detected;
Loose ceiling fixtures number in hundreds


More than 240 loose ceiling bolt fixtures are scattered throughout the Interstate 90 connector tunnel, said Turnpike Authority officials, who announced yesterday that the tunnel could remain closed for weeks as engineers determine whether to repair or replace the tunnel's drop ceiling.

The problems with the connector tunnel went unnoticed until after Monday night, when the car Del Valle was riding in to Logan International Airport was crushed by two ceiling panel sections that had come loose.

Each panel was secured to the top of the I-90 connector tunnel by bolt fixtures that include the bolts, epoxy, and metal plates. Tieback rods hang from the plate and suspend steel beams supporting the concrete panels.

The bolts were inserted into holes drilled in the ceiling, then glued into place using high-strength epoxy. When properly installed, the metal plates are tightly flush against the tunnel's ceiling. The suspect bolts are in places where gaps between the plates and ceiling are at least one-sixteenth of an inch.

Yesterday, work crews finished removing the remaining 10 ceiling panel sections, which engineers call modules, from the eastbound I-90 connector tunnel. Each panel was cataloged by law enforcement officials who are working alongside Turnpike Authority crews to build a potential criminal case. The work crews also plan to remove eight panel sections from above the westbound lanes and 10 from above the high-occupancy vehicle lanes.

Turnpike Authority inspectors conducting visual examinations of the ceiling found 50 problem bolt fixtures in the eastbound section, 10 fewer than the number the Turnpike Authority had estimated on Wednesday. The westbound section had 68, the HOV lane 45, and two exit ramps had a total of 79.

Big Dig chief engineer Michael Swanson explained yesterday that the 242 problematic bolts were visually identified by small gaps between the steel plate and the ceiling. He said officials did not know whether any of these had endangered motorists.



`

[wtm442]

What if we started a fund to fix the tunnels. Each one of us could send in a roll of 100 MPH tape, so they could fix the problem correctly.

I can hear heads hitting the floor right now.

[jams]

If you drive really fast through the tunnel would it lesson your risk of getting hit by a piece of the ceiling.

Maybe they should just raise the speed limit and not worry about the bolts!

[wtm442]

Wow

Only 1400 bolt problems. Maybe we should fill in the tunnels and make an elevated highway

The tunnels will probably be closed for months.

Interstate 93 and the Mass Pike have been officially awarded the honor of being the worlds longest parking lot.

Boy, am I glad I do not have to drive into Boston every day. A trip to the airport used to take 20 minutes. Now, its probably 1.5 to 2 hours.

[Ron61]

Why don't you suggest the thought of putting all highways underground thus eliminating the occasional tunnel?

Ron

[wtm442]

Ron
Only if we could do the same with all the politicians

[Ron61]

Gee, Warren, would you really want to pollute the ground that much.

Ron

[wtm442]

Absopositivolutly

Bury 'em deep where its hot!

[Ron61]

Why bother with burying them. Just make them all go stand in one of the tunnels until it collapses on them.

Ron

[wtm442]

cuz if you do not bury them, they might escape!

[Don]

Workers doubted ceiling method
Firm prevailed on fasteners despite tests

By Sean P. Murphy and Raja Mishra, Globe Staff | July 18, 2006

Field tests by construction workers indicated that bolt-and-epoxy fasteners might not support the multi-ton ceiling panels in the Interstate 90 connector tunnel, but the firm that designed the tunnel persuaded Big Dig officials to use the system anyway, law enforcement officials said yesterday.

At the same time, Big Dig officials became so confident in the epoxy used to secure the bolt fixtures that they canceled laboratory tests to regularly check if the high-strength glue was working properly, according to documents obtained by the Globe yesterday.

The Massachusetts Turnpike Authority and lead management contractor Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff approved both decisions as the tunnel ceiling was built in 1999.

The massive investigation into last week's death of Milena Del Valle -- killed when concrete ceiling panels fell on her car -- has focused on the failure of the bolt-and-epoxy ceiling fixtures. Governor Mitt Romney said yesterday that tests completed over the weekend found that nearly all 1,150 bolt-and-epoxy ceiling fixtures in the I-90 connector tunnel were unreliable.

As the connector tunnel ceiling was under construction, Modern Continental Corp. workers expressed concerns after field tests indicated the bolt fixtures were unsound, law enforcement officials said.

The workers' concerns were sent to Modern Continental, which was building the tunnel; Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff; and the Turnpike Authority, which runs the Big Dig, the officials said.

The design firm, Gannett Fleming Inc., countered that its design was safe, the officials said. Although it was unclear how the debate played out, in the end, the Big Dig kept Gannett Fleming's design for the ceilings in the tunnel, which opened in January 2003.

``There were questions raised about whether this design was adequate to carry the weight and hold the weight that it's expected to hold," said Attorney General Thomas F. Reilly , who is leading an investigation into whether criminal charges are warranted in Del Valle's death. ``That was clearly raised, and now we're at the stage of finding out what was the result of that dispute."

A Gannett Fleming official said he could not recall the debate.

``I am not aware of any details," Don Nicholas , a Gannett Fleming vice president who worked on the Big Dig, said in a telephone interview yesterday. ``We have not gone back and looked at records. Right now, we are focused on helping out to get it fixed and the roadways back open."

Reilly said yesterday that he would continue to probe the dispute. His office has subpoenaed documents from Gannett Fleming, as well as Modern Continental, Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff, and the Turnpike Authority.

Others had also questioned if the bolt-and-epoxy fixtures could hold the 2 1/2- to 3-ton ceiling panels.

James F. Bruno , who served as project manager for Modern Continental on the contract, told the Globe last week that in meetings with Big Dig officials, he and other construction managers suggested using a lighter material for the ceiling.

Big Dig officials refused, saying that lighter material would require more supports because it would vibrate more during heavy winds or traffic. The ceiling, suspended from the tunnel roof, created a ventilation path.

At about the same time this debate was unfolding in 1999, Big Dig officials decided that laboratory testing on the epoxy was no longer necessary, according to project documents.

Until then, the bonding strength of the epoxy used in the ceiling fixtures had been tested at a lab set up to check materials including concrete, steel, and waterproofing sealants. But ``based on project experience and the resulting level of confidence," testing of ``epoxies for anchoring" was waived, according to a May 26, 1999, memo sent out to engineers on the project.

``This revision has been reviewed and approved by" Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff, state officials, and the Federal Highway Administration, the memo said.

A spokesman for Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff said the firm ``is not in a position to comment because fact-gathering is just beginning." The Turnpike Authority did not respond to inquiries yesterday.

Robert Johnson , chief spokesman for the US Department of Transportation, said his agency ``is reviewing years of records and decisions."

``It would be premature to comment on any particular document or documents," he said in a statement.

Glue on bolts removed from the tunnel roof near the accident site was brittle and cracked, not like smooth glass as it should have been, a source briefed on the state investigation but not authorized to speak publicly has told the Globe. Similar ceiling bolts in the Ted Williams Tunnel failed safety tests in 1994 because construction workers failed to mix the two epoxy ingredients correctly, didn't let it harden long enough, or failed to clean the surfaces being glued together, according to a state report.

Reilly disclosed the conflict over the design of the bolt-and-epoxy fasteners in a news conference after a tour of the Big Dig accident site, but would not release more information.

Documents obtained by the Globe also indicate that the design was questioned.

In the summer of 1999, Gannett Fleming made numerous revisions in its original fixture design, including one on July 8 that is described in Big Dig records as a change of the ``project criteria for precast concrete ceiling system," indicating that the firm believed design changes were needed.

That revision request was made on the same day that the Modern Continental contract was modified due to ``adhesive anchor failure" -- evidence that the fixtures failed tests in which devices pulled on the bolts to see if they would come loose.

The ongoing investigation is not the first time Gannett Fleming's work on the Big Dig has been questioned.

In 2004, Edward M. Ginsburg , the retired probate court judge who was then pursuing refunds for shoddy work on behalf of the state, filed breach of contract lawsuits against Gannett Fleming and eight other smaller design firms under the supervision of Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff.

Gannett Fleming's work on the Big Dig, including the I-90 connector tunnel, ``contained numerous defects, errors and omissions," the lawsuit alleged..

[jams]

Let the finger pointing begin!!!