Engineers plan to keep a close eye on a section of the Quarrier Street parking garage at the Town Center Mall in Charleston after a Thursday morning collapse.
A 20-foot by 30-foot concrete slab fell from the garage’s sixth floor to the fifth floor taking a small loader with it. This requires immediate repairs on the parking garage.
There were no injuries and no other vehicles were damaged.
Charleston Building Commissioner Tony Harmon says construction crews have been preparing the sixth floor for resurfacing. He says the area that collapsed had been weakened by water pressure used to remove the old surface.
Mall officials say a construction worker parked the machine, which weighed 8,000 lbs.over the weakened section and the weight caused the collapse.
“It’s not like the building was falling down in disrepair or anything like that,” Harmon said. “It’s where they were working on it and had an accident.”
Harmon says the engineering staff of the mall’s parent company will issue a report. He says the city wants to make sure all precautionary measures are taken.
Harmon says the construction crews took the right steps in blocking off much of the area of the sixth and fifth floors because of the ongoing work.
“They had a lot of it blocked off because they were working above,” he said.
(Photo courtesy Ashley Smith, WCHS-TV)