Spokane's River Park Garage Accident

I am not a construction engineer but the collapse of a retaining wall on the fifth floor of Spokane's River Park Square parking garage smells like shoddy construction to me. On Saturday, April 8, 2006, Jo Savage managed to drive her Subaru though a 5-inch thick section of wall and plunge to her death. The photo in the Spokesman Review shows a five-foot section of preformed concrete broken and hanging from rebar. What seems odd to me is that there was no damage to the sides of the dislodged piece as if there were no interconnections between the panels. By failing to connect the wall together the retaining strength is reduced dramatically with disastrous results. Ms. Savage should have spun her wheels to the rims instead breaking through a ‘retaining wall’.