Narration:
Engineering safety investigation carried out subsequent upon ingress of water up to 1.5m depth into the basement, first time after 18 months of use.
Report of the investigation concluded that;
- The structural system of the building has not been impaired by reason of the deluge into the basement; no cracks were observed on either columns, beams, slabs or even block wall claddings,
- The project team failed to carry out a proper geotechnical investigation of the underlying soil beneath the basement, to have adequately established its physical & engineering properties ahead of designing a suitable foundation,
- The results of the geotechnical investigation would have prompted the design engineer of the need to provide adequate flexural resistance in the ground slab of the basement against “Heave” from the underlying expansive clayey soils,
- Re-design of the failed basement slab to have both sufficient flexural capacity & Counterweight against uplift from the expanding clay soil.
|
