Assignment
Assignment
Assignment
There is no hesitation that the field of engineering and technology has simplified our
lives and produced some unambiguous achievements in human history. However,
there have also been plenty of engineering failings that have triggered unforgettable
catastrophes due to negligence, underestimations, carelessness and inadequate
knowledge, improper understanding and corruption. These engineering errors have
sometimes led to immeasurable damages to a society or to a nation. Rest assured, all
these unconceivable disasters have left the new generation of engineers more vigilant
than ever.
Bangladesh is one of the world’s most heavily populated country with population of
around 168 million having an area of 50,259 sq. miles [1]. It is also the 2nd largest
readymade garments (RMG) exporters in the world sharing 6.5% of total share [2]. But
it could have been in far better position if a catastrophic incident would not have
happened. On April 24, 2013 a building of eight floors name “Rana Plaza” situated
near the capital, Dhaka collapsed enormously which resulted in death of 1132 people
and severe injuries to 2500 people [3] [4]. It is still considered to be the worst man-
made disaster in the history of Bangladesh. The sufferings of the victims of that
incident is still buzzing around the area. Many people have lost their closed ones and
even many did not get to see the dead bodies of their relatives for the last time. No
one could have ever thought of such disaster because of an engineering error. Though
it is said to be an engineering error, many people other than engineers were also taken
to custody.
Figure 1 The collapse of Rana Plaza and it's catastrophe [5] [6] [7]
Engineering Failure
Engineering failure is an interruption in a technical identity that is designed and
planned by an engineer failing to complete its perseverance of actuality and leading
to disaster. Engineering disaster arises when an engineered system fails and stops
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functioning which in turn may lead to a disaster. A "failure" is quite different from a
"malfunction," in which situation the system may work appropriately next time you turn
it on.
In the field of engineering, the perception of failure is somewhat very familiar. But the
engineers have the responsibilities of making any system that can operate without
failure. So in case of any engineering design, a lot of thought procedures have been
taken. Thus the enormous disasters that do happen are eventually because of failures
of design. Again those disasters can teach a good lesson to the engineers about their
lack of knowledge and capabilities that eventually generates better methods of
designing a system but sometimes with cost of human lives. Without a doubt, failures
appear to be unavoidable in the path of elongated success that encourages lower
boundaries of safety and security. To avoid those failures more cautions and care
needs to be taken in case of dealing with human lives.
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had been found guilty of that incident. Though the official report from the government
agencies was not found, several private organization published their case study and
investigation report. After reviewing a lot of literatures the following reasons have been
found for causing the catastrophe [8] [4] [6] [9]:
• Inadequate knowledge
• Underestimation of impact
• Ignorance, carelessness, negligence
• Obliviousness, error
• Unavailability of proper structural drawing
• Technical deficiency- In many cases, the engineers did not pay attention to
any technical issues. Some are as following:
o Brick chips was used as coarse aggregate-
o Check of construction constituents (rebar, cement, concrete etc ) was
never done
o No standard QC and QA was followed
o Insufficient assessment of safety procedure as related systems are
modernized
o Inadequate or unsatisfactory observing of installation or construction
(engineer)
o Design concrete strength f’c and steel strength fy was not specified in
the submitted structural design
o Keeping heavy machines at the building.
o Generators installed on roof tops as well as other floors.
o Not to test the soil when was the building constructed.
o Do not use the proper drawing map when the building had been
constructed.
o Keep excess raw-materials in different floors at the building.
o Excess number of workers in different levels of the building
o In spite of crashing the wall not to take proper steps.
o Inappropriate or inadequate assessment conventions
o Inspection procedures not restructured like design alterations and
upgraded methods
o Manufacturing fault
o Insufficient built in safety methods
o Insufficient specifications or strategies regarding construction procedure
o Insufficient consideration of the consequence of adjoining systems (eg.
Vibration frequencies, corrosion due to specific metals contacting,
influence of electromagnetic interference, etc.).
o Dangerous situations or environments, and, most frequently and
significantly combinations of these causes.
o Used unstable pillars use for the building.
o Using the lower pillars for constructing the building.
o Equipment security conventions not followed to by end user
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o Emergency measures were not installed
• Work progress was never submitted to concerned authority
• Depend on upon others without sufficient control
• Accurately unknown condition
• Absence of proper detailing
• Imprecise designation of responsibilities
• Knowledge of product
• Faulty construction sequence/ method
• Poor material choice
• Insufficient or inappropriate vulnerability assessment and performance
evaluation
• Insufficient investigation and research of previous design failures
• The problems of building infrastructure
• Giving the error decision for foundation recognition
• Using political extortion for constructing the building illegally
• Not to build for facing earthquake
• Make the building on an abandon pond by filling soil
• Lack of ethics to build the building
Discussion
After analyzing the causes of the incident from several reports I have been compelled
to say that it is indeed a great failure for engineering community. The engineers did
not have sufficient knowledge about the site and its environment. The engineers
associated with the project did not have much experience and expertize of developing
commercial buildings. The engineers were not aware of the detrimental effect of the
faulty structure. The structure was a clear reflection of carelessness, ignorance and
negligence from the engineers, owners and concerned authority. No one really cared
about the structure at the time of making that it could have heavy machines. Despite
notifying about the cracks, the engineers could not believe about their constructional
error. The concerned authority could not find any architectural design of the building.
There had been no progress report found by the concerned authority. In some cases
the concerned engineers were not even present at the site rather they depend on
junior inexperienced engineers or technicians. The chief engineer did not even have
any clue about the project site and its structural design [4]. There were hardly any
details on pillars, columns or iron rods and their sustainability. Delegation of
responsibilities is one of the key factor in a project. But in this case no such thing was
present. The engineers did not even have the market review of the products for making
the building rather they just choose cheaper materials. The applied method of
construction was found to be faulty. The building materials were very poor and even
in some cases the ratio of water cement sand was not even maintained. There were
no testing of the building for hazardous situation which led to devastation. No research
or study had been carried out thinking about the failures of the design. The whole
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building infrastructure was a big threat from the opening. The foundation was made
for building a five storeyed building whereas eight floors were built and two more were
on process. Political extortion was one important catalyst of making the building
illegally without thinking about approval from the concerned authority. The building
was made without following any national or international building code. The negligence
was so much that the building was built in a place where an abandon pond was
located. In every aspect of making the building, there had been serious unethical
deeds. It is to some extent worked as a catalyst for the incident.
Conclusion
The rana plaza tragedy has been the worst catastrophe in the history of Bangladesh.
It had an adverse effect on country’s economy. In fact many factories are still trying
hard to get a good place in the world RMG sector. The incident had shaken the
structural engineers mostly as it is the deadliest incident till date. The engineers are
the responsible one for this incident but not the only one to blame. Actually the whole
system had been affected by unethical doings. Corruption has compelled the
engineers making these mistakes because of their negligence and carelessness.
Moreover, the concerned authority was also paying no attention to that kind of
dangerous workplace before the incident. Nowadays, the system has changed a lot
and engineers have learnt a great lesson but with the cost of so many innocent lives.
References
[1] The United Nations, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population
Division, " World Population Prospects: The 2017 Revision," Worldometers,
[Online]. Available: https://www.worldometers.info/world-population/bangladesh-
population. [Accessed 21 May 2019].
[2] "Textile Today," Amin & Jahan Corporation Ltd, [Online]. Available:
https://www.textiletoday.com.bd/bd-remains-2nd-largest-rmg-exporter-
accounting-6-5-percent/. [Accessed 21 May 2019].
[3] M. M. Nisa and K. G. Moazzem, "100 Days of Rana Plaza Tragedy-A Report on
Commitments and Delivery," Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD), Dhaka,
Bangladesh, 2013.
[4] M. N. Haque, "The Collapsing Reasons of Rana Plaza as well as the Effects and
Threats on Economy in Bangladesh," Dhaka International University, Dhaka,
Bangladesh, 2013.
[5] M. Lavergne, "A year after the Rana Plaza collapse, Canadian clothing makers
lag their global peers," Rogers Media, 2014.
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[6] R. U. Mirdha, "RMG Factories Since Rana Plaza Disaster: Workplace safety
improved a lot," The Daily Star, Dhaka, 2018.
[7] N. Nittle, "What the Rana Plaza Disaster Changed About Worker Safety," Vox
Media, Dhaka, 2018.
[8] M. Gavin, "Rana Plaza Structural and Ethical Failure," Tae Hong Lin, December
2, 2015.
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