This case involves a twenty-seven-year-old male who was working on the construction of an apartment building. The construction worker was installing a balcony railing system on the second-floor. As he was securing the railing to the balcony’s cement foundation, he lost his footing and slipped off the edge. The worker fell into an area that was littered with construction tools and debris. He suffered severe lacerations to his torso, a broken femur, and a compound fracture in one of his arms. He has been unable to return to work for the past six months.

There are very specific fall protection guidelines outlined by OSHA that must be implemented when a worker is exposed to the hazard of falling. The worker should have been outfitted with a fall arrest system similar to a climbing harness. These particular systems can be anchored to various parts of the building to protect the worker from falling. The harness build must be able to support a fall that is equal to 1,800 pounds (8 kilonewtons) and be rigged so that the worker may not free fall more than six feet. Additionally, these individuals must be adequately trained to use these fall protection systems. If this person was correctly outfitted with a such a device, their injuries could have been avoided. I have over twenty years of experience working as a construction foreman and have extensive knowledge of OSHA's Fall Protection guidelines.

1. What are the proper safety standards for construction workers operating at an elevated height?

Construction Worker Falls from Balcony and Sustains Serious Injuries

This case involves a construction company that purchased a partially built house. The president of the construction company personally installed the water line to the house and then sold the home as complete to a homeowner, assuring him that the home was essentially airtight and waterproof. The sale contract included a 1-year express warranty against defects in materials and workmanship. When the homeowner received a much higher than average water bill, he initially thought this was due to lawn care in the springtime months. The homeowner’s next water bill even higher and he looked for evidence of a leak above the ground. When he did not find a leak, he contacted the construction company. The construction company dug up the water line and discovered that the main water line had separated from a coupling due to corrosion, creating a gap through which water was escaping. The water went underneath the foundation slab of the house and caused heaving, which resulted in cracks in the walls and uneven doors. The homeowner sued the president of the construction company for negligence claiming that he had negligently installed the plumbing.

In most cases, a plumber has a legal duty to a homeowner—independent of any contract with the homeowner—to perform plumbing services without causing economic injury to the homeowner. This is called the “economic loss doctrine.” In a case like this, where an individual plumber has undertaken the work as a plumber (independent of his role as the president of the construction company that sold the house), he is liable for damages caused by faulty installation of the plumbing because he owes a legal duty of care to the homeowner to properly install the plumbing. The reason behind this duty is that the warranty in the sale contract may not be sufficient to protect the homeowner because many home defects are not discoverable until after the warranty period has expired. The president of the construction company in this case was negligent because the pipe separation and water leak caused the homeowner to suffer economic damage and this damage could have reasonably been foreseen by the plumber since he failed to properly install the plumbing in the house. Since the president of the construction company owed a duty to the homeowner, he should have taken steps to prevent the pipe separation. In this case, he should have used harnessed couplings or used rigid couplings that would have secured the pipes and prevented any separation or movement.

1. Can a homeowner sue the president of a construction company for negligence if the president personally installed the plumbing for a house and the main water line separated from a coupling and caused damage to the house?

Homeowner Sues Contractor Over Plumbing Defect

This case involves a ten-year-old boy who was playing at a construction site. A home was being built at the site and there was an excavation with mounds of dirt and a concrete flooring foundation that was visible. Several children had noticed the site and had been playing around the area. While the boy was playing, he forcefully fell to the bottom of an excavation and died as a result of severe bodily injuries. There was no fence or barricade around the excavation and there were no warning signs at the site. The boy’s parents sued the construction company claiming that they were negligent in failing to warn people about the dangers at the site and failing to properly guard the premises.

Cases like this one are commonly known as “attractive nuisance” cases. The law states that someone may be held liable for an injury to a child if they maintain a dangerous condition on land and the condition is likely to attract children who are incapable of understanding the danger in the area. This doctrine applies to homeowners and may also apply in cases like this where a construction company has created a dangerous condition that is likely to attract children. In construction cases, if the construction company has created a dangerous condition and it is foreseeable that a child might get hurt at the construction site, the construction company may be held liable for negligence. In this case, the construction company was probably negligent because they probably knew that children had been playing at the site and they could have foreseen the danger of a fall created by the excavation and mounds of dirt. Since the danger to children was foreseeable, the construction company in this case should have taken proper steps to prevent children from playing there such as installing temporary fencing around the area and only allowing access to the site through a locked gate.

1. Can the parents of a child that is injured at a construction site sue the construction company if the company does not barricade the site or provide warnings of dangers at the site?

Child Dies in Fall at Construction Site

This case involves the owner of a of a ten-story apartment building who took out a “named perils” property insurance policy. The insurance network policy covered direct physical loss or damage caused by any of 14 kinds of events. The insurance policy covered vandalism and described this as willful and malicious damage to or destruction of the property. A company that owned a lot next to the building decided to build a new building there that included an underground parking garage. The company hired contractors to do the excavation. The excavation caused cracks in the walls and foundations of the apartment building and when the cracks became more pronounced, the building began to settle. The owner of the apartment building was afraid that the building would collapse so he complained to the city’s Department of Buildings. The Department issued a series of violations and “stop work” orders, but the contractors ignored these orders and kept working. The owner of the apartment building made a claim under its policy and the insurance company rejected the claim. The owner then brought a lawsuit claiming that the excavation work was “vandalism” and was covered by the insurance policy.

A “named perils” policy is a kind of disaster insurance policy that provides coverage for certain specific events that are named in the policy. The issue in this case is whether the owner of the apartment building can seek coverage for the damage caused by the excavation project even though the damage to the building resulted from acts not directed at the covered property. The insurer in this case probably rejected the initial claim because it did not consider construction-related damage to be vandalism. In general, vandalism does not need to specifically directed at the damaged property in order for an insured property owner to bring a claim under a “named perils” policy. This is because vandalism usually covers malicious acts that cause unintended damage to a property. In cases like this one where an excavator digs a hole and does so in conscious disregard of likely damage to an adjacent building, the excavator is usually held to have committed a reckless act of vandalism. In this case, the excavator’s intentional avoidance of stop-work orders probably was malicious conduct and the resulting damage was probably vandalism that was covered by the named perils policy.

1. Can the owner of an apartment building that has a named perils insurance policy bring a claim for “vandalism” under the policy based on damage to a building from an adjacent excavation project?

Named Perils Insurance Policy Covers Vandalism to Building

A civil engineering expert witness advises on a case involving the design and construction of a commercial building in New Hampshire. Plaintiffs engaged defendant civil/structural engineer and his firm to design a concrete foundation for a pre-engineered metal building. Plaintiff alleges the design was defective, which resulted in cracking and damage to the building that must now be repaired.

Plaintiffs assert claims of professional negligence and breach of contract.

We performed two field evaluations which included collecting field data, measurements, and photographic documentation to ascertain the as-built conditions of the structure and to document distress to the structure's slab. It is my opinion that the design of the foundation of the subject structure prepared by defendant engineer and his company violated the 2003 International Building Code as amended by the city and was not in conformance with nationally recognized standards including the Guide for Concrete Flooring and Slab Construction (ACI 302.1R-96). A licensed professional engineer adhering to reasonable standards of professional care would not have committed the following acts, errors, or omissions in the design of the foundation of the subject structure as itemized herein. It is our opinion that the defendants failed to adhere to the standard of care and committed the following: • Improper design and detailing of the longitudinal reinforcement in the concrete piers and load transfer mechanism to the pre-engineered metal building superstructure to resist foreseeable vertical tensile forces imparted to the foundation from the superstructure due to wind loading: In particular, the detailed longitudinal reinforcement within the piers and the load transfer mechanism from the superstructure is inadequate to resist the loads specified in the superstructure construction documents. We have identified locations where the tensile demand specified in the superstructure construction documents exceeds the code-permitted capacity of the piers by up to approximately 30%. These deficiencies are outside of acceptable margins for error, and indicate conditions which will require repair/strengthening for the structure to be brought into conformance with the applicable building code. • Improper detailing of expansion joints: Properly specified expansion joints in slab-on-grade construction should include smooth dowels which allow the joint to open as the concrete shrinks. Defendants instead specified deformed reinforcing bars which restrain the joint from opening as the concrete shrinks. Additionally, properly detailed joints in slabs subject to hard-wheeled material handling vehicle traffic, such as the subject structure, should specify filling the joints with a semi-rigid filler to limit the distress to the joint edges. Defendants failed to specify this filler. These deficiencies in the construction documents resulted in spalls and fractures in the slab at the expansion joints that will require repair. • Failure to specify the layout and detailing of control joints for the concrete slab-on-grade within the structure: Properly specified control joints in slab-on-grade construction limit the frequency and width of random fractures within the area of the slab. It is the responsibility of the designer to specify control joint spacing, thickness, and reinforcement requirements. Defendants failed to specify these requirements. This failure resulted in fractures in the slab throughout the slab area that will require repair. In addition to the above-mentioned items, it is our opinion that defendant engineer failed to follow the standard of care in preparing his construction documents. In particular, he failed to identify the applicable building code and design loads on the construction documents and failed to specify the material requirements for the concrete and reinforcing steel. This information is required to be included in the construction documents as specified by the building code.

1. What standards apply to this type of construction? 2. Were those standards breached? How were they breached?

Northeast

New Hampshire

Civil Engineering Expert Witness Advises on Design Defect That Caused Structural Damage

This case involves injuries that were sustained by a construction worker who was part of a crew responsible for clearing the foundation of a skyscraper that was under construction from intruding groundwater. As a part of this function, the man was charged with assisting a team of riggers who were bringing in heavy duty pumping equipment into the base of the foundation via a pulley system. The bottom of the foundation was more than 70 feet below sea level, and at the time of the incident in question was covered with a thick layer of grime and water, which made it hard to walk. On this occasion, the man was part of a crew tasked with receiving one of the larger pieces of pumping equipment. The area was dark, and the crew had to provide illumination with headlamps and other small light sources. Eventually, the piece of equipment slipped, falling on the man’s feet and causing massive damage. It was alleged that there were multiple lapses in common safety protocols.

I have been supervising construction for over 15 years, with a majority of that time directly related to safety. I have obtained several credentials in the field from several training institutes, which allow me to have a specific understanding of not only the OSHA 1926, and 1910 regulations, but a great understanding of Best Management Practices (BMPs). I have worked along with the Occupation Health & Safety Advisory Services OHSAS 18001 standards for occupational health that is becoming more adapted throughout the nation and international communities. As for my rigging experience, I have authored several critical lift plans which exceed the minimum OSHA 1926 standards for demanding EH&S clients such as the USACE, I have been the lift supervisor on several technical and critical lifts. I am a certified Rigger, and I instruct rigging classes that are used in the petro-chemical industry for turnaround work for refineries. I have conducted, and supervised lifts from a 1.5 ton chain fall to a 500 ton, double luffing jib, with 380 feet of lattice boom.

This expert has over 15 years of experience as a construction and safety manager, managing all phases of building construction, demolition, and environmental remediation. He is Certified as a Construction Health and Safety Technician, a Construction Quality Control Manager, and a Construction Reviewer, while he has completed numerous OSHA safety courses. This expert has extensive experience with the New York Department of Transportation, the New York Department of Environment Protection, as well as the New York Department of Buildings. As a Site Safety Health Officer for the Dover Air Force Base, 50,000 man hours were logged with zero loss time incidents under his supervision. As a Safety Manager for MWHC Global, he developed, planned, and managed specific environmental health and safety programs including Fall Prevention Protection, Critical Lift (crane), Excavation and Trenching, and Scaffolding and Raised Platform, all in compliance with OSHA 1910, 1926, and EM 385 1-1. Currently, this expert is the Owner and Principal of an environmental and construction health and safety consulting firm, where he is regularly contracted as a Safety Manager/Coordinator for various construction projects.

1. Please discuss on your safety supervisory experience. 2. What is the extent of your rigging experience as it pertains to the types of lifting mechanisms employed during "dewatering"? 3. What are some of the safety protocols in "dewatering" as described in the summary?

Location: Delaware Certified, Construction Health and Safety Technician Certified, Construction Quality Control Manager Certified, Construction Reviewer Completed, OSHA 510 Occupational Safety and Health Standards for the Construction Industry Completed, OSHA 500 Trainer Course in Occupational Safety and Health for the Construction Industry Completed, OSHA Construction Safety 30 Hour Training Completed, OSHA HAZWOPER 40 Hour Training Former C*********** M****** A************** Former S***** M****** M*** G***** Former S***** S********* S********* Current O**** a** P******** e************ a** c*********** h***** a** s***** c********* f***

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Foundation Expert Witness Case Studies

Construction Worker Falls from Balcony and Sustains Serious Injuries

Homeowner Sues Contractor Over Plumbing Defect

Child Dies in Fall at Construction Site

Named Perils Insurance Policy Covers Vandalism to Building

Civil Engineering Expert Witness Advises on Design Defect That Caused Structural Damage

Labor and OSHA Standards Expert Evaluates Construction Site Injury

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