The company who built the Cowboys Facility.

[MapleLeaf]

They are located about 20 minutes from where I live. Their buildings are throughout the world and have been successful structures.

Unfortunately from the ones I have seen or played inside they do not have adequate anchoring into the ground and use singular style of support structure and raw material.

It wouldn't surprise me if there was harmonic resonance/rhythm that built up in the structure and from the sway cause some of the main anchor bolts to shear out of the ground.

With the right type of wind and the aging of the fabric exterior think "kite". I have seen here on many farm installations with aged fabric billowing in the wind. When the facility is new the fabric looks tightly stretched. As it ages it begins to billow and stretch.

I believe the Cowboys facility was one of the "Titan" structures. In my opinion too high of a peak truss system to build without anchor points outside of the building footprint.

If as Carpenter says he has been in the building when the lights have swayed before that's not a good thing.

Still a good company.

 

[silverbear]

According to reports, the fabric was recently replaced...

I have also read that they are being sued for another of their buildings that collapsed... this leads me to suspect a design or construction defect... I mean, the Metroplex has been known to get those kinds of high winds before, the Cowboys must have specified a structure that would stand up to the winds...

 

[Hostile]

I saw some steel beams in the video footage. The steel stairways were certainly structurally sound yet some of them came down too. All it takes is one section to have an issue and a lot of damage can happen.

Thank goodness more people were not seriously hurt. I am very proud of the players, coaches, and staff who helped each other. This is a tragedy but it could have been a lot worse.

 

[cwbyfn1957]

Does anyone remember the airplane that went down at DFW, maybe 10-15 yrs ago? It was hit by a microburst, in the middle of a storm like they had Saturday. I am guessing, by eyewitness accounts, the same thing happened here.
That kind of thing you cannot plan for. Unfortunatly, it happened right over the Bubble, and i'm not sure a temporary building like that could be built to handle the kind of winds(high speed and downward direction in a small area) that occur in one of those storms.

 

[PosterChild]

One thing nobody is bringing up is that we knew these storms were coming for days. Without regard to precise engineering principles or the predicted integrity of this particular bldg under various scenarios, one look at the facility and you know that's NOT where you wish to be when a freakish Texas thunderboomer hits. So, it seems to me if blame is going to be assigned, and it may well come to that, everyone should have been evacuated well in advance of this event. I've been thru tons of these storms and I haven't experience the torrents of rain like I witnessed fr this storm. It was extraordinary--even by our stds.

 

[PosterChild]

Does anyone remember the airplane that went down at DFW, maybe 10-15 yrs ago? It was hit by a microburst, in the middle of a storm like they had Saturday. I am guessing, by eyewitness accounts, the same thing happened here.
That kind of thing you cannot plan for. Unfortunatly, it happened right over the Bubble, and i'm not sure a temporary building like that could be built to handle the kind of winds(high speed and downward direction in a small area) that occur in one of those storms.

Yes, I not only remember, I heard that crash fr about 8 miles away...and you're right, at least to my understanding, I think this burst was sort of funneled or concentrated toward that relatively narrow band, where unfortunately, the bubble happened to be.

 

[MapleLeaf]

...you see a lot of these structures used to house materials and supplies.

I'm not too sure now that people should be housed under them. It may be a relatively inexpensive structure, but we are talking about people's safety.

In your neck of the woods you are much more aware of the type of weather you can get. Everything should be designed for the worst possible situation encountered in the past.

 

[silverbear]

...you see a lot of these structures used to house materials and supplies.

I'm not too sure now that people should be housed under them. It may be a relatively inexpensive structure, but we are talking about people's safety.

In your neck of the woods you are much more aware of the type of weather you can get. Everything should be designed for the worst possible situation encountered in the past.

I have a hunch that Jerry will spend a few more bucks, go with a somewhat more permanent, stable structure, when he rebuilds...

 

[jumanji]

jerry may have found his jerry world title sponsor....either that or he sues the crap out of them

 

[jcollins28]

Does anyone remember the airplane that went down at DFW, maybe 10-15 yrs ago? It was hit by a microburst, in the middle of a storm like they had Saturday. I am guessing, by eyewitness accounts, the same thing happened here.
That kind of thing you cannot plan for. Unfortunatly, it happened right over the Bubble, and i'm not sure a temporary building like that could be built to handle the kind of winds(high speed and downward direction in a small area) that occur in one of those storms.

Wasn't that in the 80's? Time fly's but I'm pretty sure it was longer then 10-15 years ago.

 

[fan62]

How many times a year, do we hear, in Texas, of a high school gym structure being taken down by either straight line winds or a tornado. It is just almost a common occurrence in Texas. I don't care what kind of "practice" field Jerry builds, that is cost effective, is going to 100% safe in this state. The thing is, you need someplace safe to go to quickly when the weather gets bad. There are micro-burst sensors out there, but not sure how much warning they give. The main thing is, that in Texas you need to find a safe place during any heavy thunder storm in Texas. I have seen 37 or 38 tornado's in my life time, and have learned where to find a safe place to hide, during storms, and when to get there.

The Cowboys should have known to have someone with a radio watching the weather and evacuate the place. I very seldom rely solely on the National Weather service to know when to go to my safe place. They let me know to watch out, but the rest depends on me.

 

[tomson75]

Wasn't that in the 80's? Time fly's but I'm pretty sure it was longer then 10-15 years ago.

According to Wiki, it was August 1985....unless there was more than one at DFW.

 

[proline]

They are located about 20 minutes from where I live. Their buildings are throughout the world and have been successful structures.

Unfortunately from the ones I have seen or played inside they do not have adequate anchoring into the ground and use singular style of support structure and raw material.

It wouldn't surprise me if there was harmonic resonance/rhythm that built up in the structure and from the sway cause some of the main anchor bolts to shear out of the ground.

With the right type of wind and the aging of the fabric exterior think "kite". I have seen here on many farm installations with aged fabric billowing in the wind. When the facility is new the fabric looks tightly stretched. As it ages it begins to billow and stretch.

I believe the Cowboys facility was one of the "Titan" structures. In my opinion too high of a peak truss system to build without anchor points outside of the building footprint.

If as Carpenter says he has been in the building when the lights have swayed before that's not a good thing.

Still a good company.

It would be good to state your qualifications for making such statements. I assume you are a licensed mechanical or civil engineer with access to the drawings and calc packages for this structure, as well as the appropriate building codes?

 

[jobberone]

I think it's pointless at this time to point fingers and start with the what ifs and why nots.

Hos is right and more tactful than me. Let's remain supportive and not buy into the blame game for now. It's obvious an unusual act occurred. And it doesn't have to be a microburst. I've seen a lot of tornadoes and they do crazy things. They can dip down and disappear in a few seconds. And most buildings are not tornado or microburst proof.

Let's be glad things weren't much worse. They were bad enough as it is. Just my 2cts.

 

[notherbob]

They are located about 20 minutes from where I live. Their buildings are throughout the world and have been successful structures.

Unfortunately from the ones I have seen or played inside they do not have adequate anchoring into the ground and use singular style of support structure and raw material.

It wouldn't surprise me if there was harmonic resonance/rhythm that built up in the structure and from the sway cause some of the main anchor bolts to shear out of the ground.

With the right type of wind and the aging of the fabric exterior think "kite". I have seen here on many farm installations with aged fabric billowing in the wind. When the facility is new the fabric looks tightly stretched. As it ages it begins to billow and stretch.

I believe the Cowboys facility was one of the "Titan" structures. In my opinion too high of a peak truss system to build without anchor points outside of the building footprint.

If as Carpenter says he has been in the building when the lights have swayed before that's not a good thing.

Still a good company.

Harmonic resonance causing bolt shear seems a reasonable thing . There is a picture showing a beam falling and it looks as if the bolts sheared as the spar appears straight and undamaged. Click here to see the picture - it's the third picture down the page. (Stolen from Iceberg on his forum, Dtox Cowboys.

http://www.dtxcowboys.net/community/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=12326

 

[igtmfo]

I heard or read some witness interviewed who said it was as if one end of the structure "lifted off the ground" a few seconds before the chaos... hope I heard right. If so, it would give creedence to this thread ...

Also heard someone else interviewed say that the fabric started ripping from one of the walls (an end zone I believe I heard someone say, I guess the far end zone of the structure, not the one where everyone took cover in the videos) .., and the tear just kind of zippered its way up to the ceiling. If this is true then it wasn't the new roof fabric that was at fault.

I don't know anything about construction, just passing along what I can remember from live TV interviews ...

 

[jobberone]

Harmonic resonance causing bolt shear seems a reasonable thing . There is a picture showing a beam falling and it looks as if the bolts sheared as the spar appears straight and undamaged. Click here to see the picture - it's the third picture down the page. (Stolen from Iceberg on his forum, Dtox Cowboys.

http://www.dtxcowboys.net/community/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=12326

You sound like an engineer. Civil??

Can they tell the difference in damage from a tornado vs a microburst?

From flight training we learned that there can be shearing forces in clouds that can cause structural damage to the plane even catastrophic. And severe updrafts and downdrafts as well esp in thunderstorm clouds. It's supposedly not just the severe forces of the updraft/downdraft ie unidirectional force but also crossing from one to another. Is it possible for those kinds of forces to be at play here and not just the downdraft?

 

[Switz]

you will find and this is in no way defending the compnay that built this structure. That mid-large sizes compnaies are sued every day. I work for a compnay that over the past 30 years has been sued over 450,000 times and has yet to lose a case.

 

[TtownCowboy]

Not sure if anyone has seen or been in a storm w/a microburst. The town I live in was hit w/some of these and I've never seen damage like that. Trees far more rooted in the ground completly uprooted and houses actually looked like they had been blown up. Just a very nasty storm. No more no less.

 

[notherbob]

You sound like an engineer. Civil??

Can they tell the difference in damage from a tornado vs a microburst?

From flight training we learned that there can be shearing forces in clouds that can cause structural damage to the plane even catastrophic. And severe updrafts and downdrafts as well esp in thunderstorm clouds. It's supposedly not just the severe forces of the updraft/downdraft ie unidirectional force but also crossing from one to another. Is it possible for those kinds of forces to be at play here and not just the downdraft?

No, not an engineer but back in the 50s I was in the army and our platoon leader didn't route step us across a 12' long by 6' wide wooden bridge made of 2x6s across a storm drainage ditch and in only a few seconds that bridge was vibrating so violently we couldn't stay on it and it flipped us into the ditch and almost came in on top of us. The fall was only a few feet so no one got hurt but I became a believer in harmonic resonance right then and there.