thin slabs, utility ducts, spin

It’s been reported that Foulger-Pratt, builder for the SSTC, blames thin slabs (an inch or more less than the 10 inches called for) on interference with utility ducts that didn’t allow for the full 10-inch slab to be constructed. This raises a number of questions:

1. Did FP report the conflict to Montgomery County’s on-site construction management team? When?

2. When and how did the County’s construction management team respond?

3. Did FP inform Parsons Brinkerhoff, the SSTC’s engineer/designer, of the conflict?

4. When and how did PB respond?

5. Why didn’t the Balter Company, Montgomery County’s concrete inspection and testing firm, and special quality inspector for the SSTC, discover the conflict before concrete was poured? If they did, who did they tell, when did they tell them and when and what was their response?

6. Were other Montgomery County and WMATA personnel, who conducted periodic on-site inspections of the SSTC during construction, aware of the conflict? If so, then what did they do? And when? And what was the outcome?

I’d like to see an overlay of the subject utility ducts and see how they compare with Montgomery County’s exhibit:

 

Do the utility ducts line up with the red areas on the exhibit? Are there locations along the utility ducts where the slab is the required 10 inches thick or greater? If so, then why is the slab 10 inches or greater at some locations along the utility ducts and 9 inches or less along others?

 

There’s more spin (by all parties) going on with the SSTC than there is with a category 5 hurricane.