RE: Third grader questioned Boston's Big Dig ceiling safetyback in 1999

[Blanchard_Michael () emc com]

With the whole big dig thing being in my backyard (not literally!), I sure hope that heads will roll because of those 
bolts and the whole project being a failure solely due to corners being cut and palms being greased.  How many more 
people have to die?  What's it going to take, the tunnels collapsing totally and the lower portions of the city being 
flooded like in NOLA during Katrina?
 
  Mitt Romney's doing his hardest to get the guys responsible, it's totally unbelievable the things those guys are 
doing to stop him.... mostly at Tax payer's expense too!   
 
  sorry.... I'm off my soapbox :-)
 
Michael P. Blanchard 
Antivirus / Security Engineer, CISSP, GCIH, CCSA-NGX, MCSE
Office of Information Security & Risk Management 
EMC ² Corporation 
4400 Computer Dr. 
Westboro, MA 01580 

 

________________________________

From: funsec-bounces () linuxbox org [mailto:funsec-bounces () linuxbox org] On Behalf Of Richard M. Smith
Sent: Wednesday, July 26, 2006 12:50 PM
To: funsec () linuxbox org
Subject: [funsec] Third grader questioned Boston's Big Dig ceiling safetyback in 1999


Key quote: A third-grade girl raised her hand and asked him, ``Will those things hold up the concrete?"

________________________________

http://www.boston.com/news/traffic/bigdig/articles/2006/07/26/memo_warned_of_ceiling_collapse/ 
<http://www.boston.com/news/traffic/bigdig/articles/2006/07/26/memo_warned_of_ceiling_collapse/> 

Memo warned of ceiling collapse

Safety officer feared deaths in '99, now agonizes over tragedy

By Sean P. Murphy, Globe Staff  |  July 26, 2006

The on-site safety officer for the Interstate 90 connector directly warned his superiors at contractor Modern 
Continental Construction Co. that the tunnel ceiling could collapse because the bolts could not support the heavy 
concrete panels, and feared for his conscience if someone died as a result.

John J. Keaveney -- in a starkly-worded two-page memo sent in 1999 to Robert Coutts, senior project manager for Modern 
Continental -- wrote that he could not ``comprehend how this structure can withhold the test of time."

Keaveney added: ``Should any innocent State Worker or member of the Public be seriously injured or even worse killed as 
a result, I feel that this would be something that would reflect Mentally and Emotionally upon me, and all who are 
trying to construct a quality Project."

Keaveney, in an interview last night, said that after he raised the concern, his superiors at Modern Continental, the 
company then building the tunnel, and representatives from Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff, the private sector manager of 
the Big Dig, sought to reassure him. They told him that such a system had been tested and was proven to work.

He said Coutts told him, `` `John, this is a tried and true method,' " he recalled. He also raised the concern in 
person with Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff officials in subsequent conversations, but they said simply that they were 
doing the work to design specifications and that the ceiling would hold.

Andrew Paven, a spokesman for Bechtel/Parsons Brinckerhoff, declined to comment last night.

...

He said he really began to worry about the ceiling after a third-grade class from his hometown of Norwell came to visit 
the Big Dig for a tour in spring 1999. He showed the class some concrete ceiling panels and pointed to the bolts 
protruding from the ceiling, explaining that the panels would one day hang from those bolts.

A third-grade girl raised her hand and asked him, ``Will those things hold up the concrete?"

He started voicing concerns among his colleagues and then to managers after that. ``It was like the [third-graders] had 
pointed out the emperor has no clothes," he said. ``I said, `Yes, it would hold,' but then I thought about it."

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