Berkman: Intern did inspections on doomed project

[thelakelander]

Before it collapsed, temporary supports for the Berkman Plaza 2 parking garage were inspected by an intern engineer using incomplete building plans, the intern said Thursday during a federal hearing.

The December 2007 collapse of the six-story garage, which was in late stages of construction in downtown Jacksonville, killed one worker â€" a father doing an extra shift to afford Christmas presents.

The intern said the garage was his first experience doing everyday examination of a major construction project, a process known in Florida as threshold inspection.

He said he “looked at” the temporary supports, called shoring and reshoring, but stopped well short of warranting he spotted every problem.

full article: http://www.jacksonville.com/news/metro/2009-05-21/story/intern_did_inspections_on_doomed_project

[heights unknown]

Oops!  Couple of lawsuits will or has been in order for this one.  Huge mistake on this one trusting an intern to do the inspection especially with incomplete building plans; at least he admitted the fault he possibly made and came out with the truth.

Heights Unknown

[tufsu1]

It is important to note that this "intern" is not what we generally think of....a person with a degree in Engineering who has not yet passed the P.E. exam (can't even try for 5 years) is called an Engineer Intern (EI).

[mtraininjax]

Couple of lawsuits will or has been in order for this one.

I heard that there are already 9, including the man who died's family. The failure of the garage was not that of an intern, this was a collossal failure from the top down. Too bad not all of those at fault are in the spotlight, but they will be soon later this summer when the lawsuits are made public.