NEW YORK — A fundamental inspection error may have led to the partial collapse of a building in the Bronx this week.
The person allegedly responsible for the error inspected hundreds of other buildings in New York City, the Department of Buildings commissioner said in an exclusive interview with CBS New York on Friday.
While the city has not made a final determination on what caused a section of the building in Morris Heights to collapse on Monday, Department of Buildings Commissioner Jimmy Oddo said there was an egregious error with construction being done on the day of the collapse.
Oddo said an engineer wrote in his inspection that the corner beam of the building was simply decorative, when in reality it was holding the building together.
“It wasn’t a close call. It shouldn’t have been a close call. This should have been obvious that this pier was load bearing,” said Oddo.
Oddo said his investigation found construction work was being done on the day of the collapse, contrary to what first responders were initially told.
That work was to repair cracks in the building’s corner pier, based on an inspection report from a private engineer hired by the building’s owner.
“The drawings by the engineer that this work was predicated on made a fundamental mistake in what that pier was. It was not decorative. It was load bearing,” said Oddo.
It’s still early in the investigation, but the department’s initial findings are that workers were pulling out essential bricks before the structure came crashing down.
“He instructed the contractor to remove all the loose bricks and replace with new bricks. Clearly, removing bricks on a pier that supports six floors of the building above is not something that an engineer should direct a contractor to do without having additional temporary supports installed before you remove those bricks,” said Yegal Shamash, the department’s chief structural engineer.
“I can’t stress enough to your viewers how fundamental of a mistake this was. It should have been clear to any professional engineer licensed by the state of New York, the integral value and importance to the integrity of the building this pier was,” said Oddo.
The Department of Buildings said the same engineer submitted facade inspections for more than 300 buildings across New York City.
“And to restore the confidence of New Yorkers, we’re sending, we’re looking at all of the work done by this engineer,” said Oddo.
The department is suspending the engineer’s ability to do facade inspections in New York City and lobbying the state to reexamine the status of his license for inspections in general.
At the same time, Oddo said he’ll have to look at the city’s process for inspections with private engineers.
We reached out to the engineer for comment and are waiting to hear back.