Code Enforcement Advisory “Recent Floor Collapses in Rental Apartments”
Due to two most recent events concerning floors collapsing in apartments, we felt it was best to address this in a mass email and social media.
As recent as this Halloween weekend, an Athens rental house hosted a large house party in a first floor apartment in a relatively small room.
It was discovered that people were jumping up and down in unison to a song and the floor collapsed approximately 16 inches. Fortunately, this was on the first floor and the partial crawl space caught the floor from falling an additional several feet into the partial basement, saving what could have resulted in numerous injuries and possible deaths.
Last week there was a similar incident at an off campus rental unit in South Carolina after a football game, this resulted in numerous injuries. (See Web Page)
In Nov 2017 at Texas University campus building a same situation, people jumping up and down in unison collapse the floor injuring numerous people.
During fests we have removed people from overcrowded porches, balconies and decks, some, after seeing the very floors flexing under the weight of the crowds.
With the age of some of these homes it is very possible that the jumping up and down in unison, is the cause for such tragic events.
Please raise awareness and explain to tenants that homes were not designed to hold large crowd events, especially those which involve masses jumping up and down on wooden floors.
Sincerely
Rick Sirois, Director