Failure Case Studies of Concrete Structures

The Education Committee of the ASCE Forensic Engineering Division aims to promote civil infrastructure failure literacy of professionals in architecture, engineering, construction, and related fields. Case studies of notable failures have been shown to provide an opportunity to educate students and professionals in technical, professional, and ethical areas. The Education Committee has published several compilations of failure case studies and is currently publishing of a collection of failure case studies of concrete structures. This publication includes the Kobe Viaduct, the Norway Sleipner, the Khobar Towers, the Tropicana Casino parking garage, the Concord Overpass Collapse, the Pipers Row Car Park, the Canterbury Television building collapse, and the Alto Rio Building collapse. Each case study presents an overview of the structure and relevant background information, describes the failure and contributing causes, presents lessons learned from the failure, and provides a list of references for additional and supporting information. This paper provides an overview of this package of concrete structure failure case studies, providing highlights from three cases included in the forthcoming publication. Guidance on the use of these case studies to recognize causes of failures is presented, with emphasis placed on the fact that multiple factors (such as design errors, material deficiencies, construction defects, quality assurance issues, or communication lapses) often contribute to such failures. Lessons learned from several of the case studies are presented, and contributions of these lessons learned to the forensic engineering education and professional practice are discussed.