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Sampoong Department Store collapse
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Sampoong Department Store collapse
On June 29, 1995, the Sampoong Department Store (Korean: 삼풍백화점; Hanja: 三豐百貨店) in Seocho District, Seoul, South Korea, collapsed due to a structural failure. The collapse killed 502 people and injured 937, making it the largest peacetime disaster in South Korean history. It was the deadliest non-deliberate modern building collapse until the 2013 Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh.
Construction on the store began in 1987 and was completed in 1990. The company initially contracted to build the structure withdrew after the chairman of Sampoong Group's construction division, Lee Joon, demanded changes to the concrete support columns that introduced structural concerns. Lee Joon ultimately used his own company to complete construction. Investigators blamed the collapse primarily on this and other unsafe modifications made during the building’s construction and lifespan.
On December 27, 1995, Lee Joon was convicted of criminal negligence and sentenced to 10 years and 6 months imprisonment. His sentence was later lessened to 7 years and 6 months on appeal. His son, Lee Han-sang, was convicted of corruption and accidental homicide and sentenced to 7 years imprisonment. Additionally, two city planners from the Seocho District were convicted of taking bribes.
Following the selection of Seoul as host city of the 1988 Summer Olympics, there was a large development boom in the Seoul Capital Area. As local law did not allow foreign contractors to sign contracts for projects in Seoul at the time, almost all buildings were being erected by South Korean companies, which typically built the structures quickly and with a low quality because of the large number of projects assigned to them.
The Sampoong Group began construction of the Sampoong Department Store in 1987 over a tract of land in the Seocho District previously used as a landfill. The building's plans originally called for a residential apartment building with four floors to be built by Woosung Construction. However, during construction, the blueprints were changed by the future chairman of Sampoong Group's construction division, Lee Joon, to instead create a large mall department store. This involved cutting away a number of support columns to install escalators and the addition of a fifth floor (originally meant as a roller skating rink but later changed to a food court).
Woosung refused to carry out these changes due to serious structural concerns. In response, Lee Joon fired them and used his own company to complete the store's construction instead. The building was completed in late 1989, and the department store opened to the public on July 7, 1990, attracting an estimated 40,000 people per day during the building's five years of existence. The store consisted of north and south wings connected by an atrium.
The completed building was a flat-slab structure without crossbeams or a steel skeleton, which effectively meant that there was no way to transfer the load across the floors. To maximise the floor space, Lee Joon ordered that the diameter of the floor columns be reduced to 60 cm (24 in), instead of the minimum of 80 cm (31 in) in the original blueprint that was required for the building to stand safely. In addition, the spacing between columns was increased to 11 metres (36 ft); with fewer columns, each one had to support a larger load than originally designed. The fifth-story restaurant floor had a built-in heating system known as an ondol, with hot water pipes passing through a 1.2-metre-thick (4 ft) concrete base. The weight and thickness of the ondol further increased the load on the structure.
Three air conditioning units, weighing 15 tonnes each when empty, were installed on the roof. These units generated high noise levels when operating, leading to complaints from adjacent property owners; in an attempt to remedy the situation, they were dragged across the roof to a new location in 1993, resulting in cracking. The units were moved over column 5E, where the most visible cracks in the fifth floor were seen before the collapse. The cracks worsened because the columns supporting the fifth floor were not aligned with the ones supporting lower floors, thus causing the load of the fifth floor to be transferred through the slab.
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Sampoong Department Store collapse
On June 29, 1995, the Sampoong Department Store (Korean: 삼풍백화점; Hanja: 三豐百貨店) in Seocho District, Seoul, South Korea, collapsed due to a structural failure. The collapse killed 502 people and injured 937, making it the largest peacetime disaster in South Korean history. It was the deadliest non-deliberate modern building collapse until the 2013 Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh.
Construction on the store began in 1987 and was completed in 1990. The company initially contracted to build the structure withdrew after the chairman of Sampoong Group's construction division, Lee Joon, demanded changes to the concrete support columns that introduced structural concerns. Lee Joon ultimately used his own company to complete construction. Investigators blamed the collapse primarily on this and other unsafe modifications made during the building’s construction and lifespan.
On December 27, 1995, Lee Joon was convicted of criminal negligence and sentenced to 10 years and 6 months imprisonment. His sentence was later lessened to 7 years and 6 months on appeal. His son, Lee Han-sang, was convicted of corruption and accidental homicide and sentenced to 7 years imprisonment. Additionally, two city planners from the Seocho District were convicted of taking bribes.
Following the selection of Seoul as host city of the 1988 Summer Olympics, there was a large development boom in the Seoul Capital Area. As local law did not allow foreign contractors to sign contracts for projects in Seoul at the time, almost all buildings were being erected by South Korean companies, which typically built the structures quickly and with a low quality because of the large number of projects assigned to them.
The Sampoong Group began construction of the Sampoong Department Store in 1987 over a tract of land in the Seocho District previously used as a landfill. The building's plans originally called for a residential apartment building with four floors to be built by Woosung Construction. However, during construction, the blueprints were changed by the future chairman of Sampoong Group's construction division, Lee Joon, to instead create a large mall department store. This involved cutting away a number of support columns to install escalators and the addition of a fifth floor (originally meant as a roller skating rink but later changed to a food court).
Woosung refused to carry out these changes due to serious structural concerns. In response, Lee Joon fired them and used his own company to complete the store's construction instead. The building was completed in late 1989, and the department store opened to the public on July 7, 1990, attracting an estimated 40,000 people per day during the building's five years of existence. The store consisted of north and south wings connected by an atrium.
The completed building was a flat-slab structure without crossbeams or a steel skeleton, which effectively meant that there was no way to transfer the load across the floors. To maximise the floor space, Lee Joon ordered that the diameter of the floor columns be reduced to 60 cm (24 in), instead of the minimum of 80 cm (31 in) in the original blueprint that was required for the building to stand safely. In addition, the spacing between columns was increased to 11 metres (36 ft); with fewer columns, each one had to support a larger load than originally designed. The fifth-story restaurant floor had a built-in heating system known as an ondol, with hot water pipes passing through a 1.2-metre-thick (4 ft) concrete base. The weight and thickness of the ondol further increased the load on the structure.
Three air conditioning units, weighing 15 tonnes each when empty, were installed on the roof. These units generated high noise levels when operating, leading to complaints from adjacent property owners; in an attempt to remedy the situation, they were dragged across the roof to a new location in 1993, resulting in cracking. The units were moved over column 5E, where the most visible cracks in the fifth floor were seen before the collapse. The cracks worsened because the columns supporting the fifth floor were not aligned with the ones supporting lower floors, thus causing the load of the fifth floor to be transferred through the slab.
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