Indiana Homeland Security Says Outdoor Stages are Not Structures – More on the Indiana State Fair Collapse

By
Jim
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2
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In the ongoing and expected to be long-winded and ongoing investigation of the Indiana State Fair Stage Collapse, the Indy Star has put out another article.  This one has some interesting information in it about how Indiana Homeland Security feels about temporary outdoor stages.  From the article at the Indy Star:

Under Indiana Administrative Code, a structure — temporary or permanent — has to meet stringent code requirements, such as being able to withstand winds of up to 90 miles per hour. The winds at the fairgrounds blew less fiercely than that Saturday evening, about 60 to 70 mph, according to the National Weather Service.

But the Indiana Department of Homeland Security said temporary outdoor stages are not, strictly speaking, structures.

“You’re talking about scaffolding and equipment,” Erickson said, “not a structure.”

Well, there we have it.  Outdoor stages are just scaffolding and equipment in Indiana, not “structures,” so they don’t get inspected.  Awesome.  You really have to read this article, folks.  Let’s hope Indiana’s Department of Labor and Indiana OSHA don’t take five months to figure out what happened on this one like they did with Declan Sullivan, the University of Notre Dame student killed when the crane he was in to film a football practice tipped over in the wind.

Gah.  Go read the article at the Indy Star on this – what a crazy read to just come across.

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2 COMMENTS

  1. Jim,

    If you check the comments on boingboing about this you’ll see we’re on the same page. There is also a link to the 150th setup and you’ll notice a bit of truss missing from the 155th year that could have avoided this.

    darran

  2. I live in the UK and find this crazy……I am a lighting designer and a stage that size is a structure!!! How can they say otherwise?!? Who ever made that law up should be the one being charged in court. I feel sorry for the riggers and crew who will have this on their minds forever and its not going to be their faults. The people who died should not have died and I feel for the families and friends of them…..The officials and organizers should hang their heads in shame and should be charged over this. If this happened in the UK someone would be going to jail!

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