Sports

Watch the Roof of This Hockey Rink Collapse Seconds After Children Scramble Off the Ice

Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:01am by Madeleine Morgenstern
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A former NHL forward and group of youth hockey players escaped uninjured last week after a truly horrifying event: The roof of their hockey rink collapsed.

Richard Zednik, formerly of the Washington Capitals and New York Islanders, was skating with the young players during a training session in his native Slovakia when pieces of the ceiling began to fall, Yahoo! Sports reported. Zednik and the children cleared the rink just before the roof collapsed under the weight of the ice and snow above.

“Parents have noticed that the ceiling began to fall kind of frost, so quickly summoned the children to get them out of the ice surface. Then there was cracking and literally a few seconds the hall ceiling collapsed completely,” webnoviny.sk sports editor Oravia Brno Thomas said via translation.

As Yahoo! pointed out, in the portion of the video when it looked like someone was going through a tunnel, it was actually the roof covering the boards and the stands in the rink.

The facility had just opened in November. The cause of the collapse is under investigation.

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Comments (38)

OlefromMN
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 8:38pm
I’m from MN and found this not so exciting. Heck, we’ve had our dome collapse twice. Snow loads are something many engineers struggle with as they are a variable.
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- UrbanCombatSurvivor
  Posted on January 30, 2012 at 8:13am
  Snow loads are VERY simple to deal with: pitch the damn roof more steeply.
  Report Post »
- FoeHammer865
  Posted on January 30, 2012 at 9:32am
  Not every roof can be pitched steeply, and neither does pitching the roof remove the danger. Snow density and moisture content is always different and it’s stickyness constantly changes. Even with a steep roof, the right conditions will put 6′ of snow on a roof.
  Report Post »
- ACLUHater
  Posted on January 30, 2012 at 2:04pm
  Zednik is the guy who almost died a few years ago when a skate slashed his neck.
  Report Post »
NOT A CRAZY
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 8:28pm
It reminds me of what we are doing to our country.
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NOT A CRAZY
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 8:27pm
I want to know why people were still just standing over to the side as the roof slowing collapsed. They should have been out of the building completely.
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- Carl McPherson
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 8:58pm
  Ever try walking on ice-skates on concrete? A great way to bust your hip and break a leg if you’re in a hurry. They didn’t have a whole lot of options.
  Report Post »
Cat
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 7:47pm
Pulled this video from the depths of Windows and expanded it to wide screen
Hard to tell, but it appears a basic mistake was made by suspending primary and secondary hollow framing members by drilling too many holes through the center of the tube walls (very end of the clip)

Similar construction was used in the Kansa City, Hyatt Regency platform that collapsed in the early 80s.
The live load applied by the people on the platforms was too much for the thin walls of the tubular framing created by welding 2 ‘C’ channel members together lengthwise.

The original design called for a single rod down two levels, but the fabricator changed the design to 2 rods, one up to the ceiling and one adjacent to it running down to the next level platform, citing the longer rods would be damaged during construction.
The rods and the retaining nuts were literally pulled through the meeting ‘C’ channels when the excessive load was applied.
One too many holes

These people were lucky they had time get out of the way, because of the chain-reaction collapse, and possibly the mechanical lines assisting in slowing the collapse down.
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- drphil69
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 8:48pm
  You must be an engineer!
  Report Post »
- Cat
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 10:12pm
  Christian, conservative, tenacious, architect, engineer, general contractor, real estate developer, philanthropist, lover of freedom., and racer of unlimited cats, that’s all …
  Report Post »
- SgtB
  Posted on January 30, 2012 at 12:06am
  I believe that the collapse of which you speak was not due to the extra holes, but to the fact that the rod supporting the double tiered walkway was able to hold the weight of both tiers, but the other hardware (nuts) were only able to safely hold the weight of one tier of the walkway. By bolting the bottom tier to the top, the nuts holding up the top tier held 2x their designed maximum capacity.
  
  * = load of one tier applied to the hardware
  
  **
  |
  |
  _|_*________
  ** |
  |
  __|_________
  *
  Report Post »
- Cat
  Posted on January 30, 2012 at 6:51am
  Sgtb >
  
  Try this
  
  http://antoine.frostburg.edu/phys/invention/case_studies/disasters/kansas_city_walkway.html
  Report Post »
GoodStuff
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 6:23pm
Soviet quality construction. The commies can’t build anything right.
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doxyonr
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 4:59pm
Holy crap!
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Machtyn
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 4:50pm
The cause of the collapse is under investigation? Looks to me like there was too much snow on the roof.
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- Grasshopper42
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 5:03pm
  LMAO – Good one!
  Report Post »
- randy
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:02pm
  The facility had just opened in November. The cause of the collapse is under investigation.
  
  Union Labor
  Report Post »
abbygirl1994
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 2:46pm
Truly another miracle from God! Thank you thank you that no one was harmed!
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KangarooJack
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 2:07pm
Thank God no one was hurt…the group that just stood there (off to the side) as the roof was coming down…dang, yelling at the computer ‘GET OUT’!
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dontbotherme
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 1:57pm
Glad no one was hurt!
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forthepeople
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 12:20pm
definitely a government plan , explosive charges visible and Bush is around there someplace ?
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Phoneguy
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 12:17pm
I agree Union made for sure.
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ThankBabyJesus
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 11:45am
def bushs fault
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oldironsides
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 11:32am
obviously an inside job by their government, you can see how it came down in stages.
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readytostand
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 10:54am
Are these extra bolts or do go somewhere? (Union Foreman) yaa dont worreee abot it! Hay whadda ya know its break time.
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readytostand
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 10:45am
most likely UNION built!
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OneTermPresident
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 10:45am
Next time spend more than $100 bucks for something other than a cardboard roof.
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Stoic one
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 10:33am
Wow! Thankfully no one was hurt.
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KingCanon
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:09am
Chinese Steel is to blame I tell ya!
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- lukerw
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:23am
  More likely Russian…
  Report Post »
- dnewton
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:35am
  They should let the electricians build the next one. The lights did not even flicker as the roof came down and even after the collapse the lights stayed on.
  Report Post »
- ianmc002
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:35am
  Like the Titanic!!!! Damn you Chinese…no sulfer in the steel.
  Report Post »
- RRFlyer
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:43am
  Bush’s fault
  Report Post »
- lowerclassrepublican
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 10:31am
  The only problem with Chines steel. It’s all computer manufactured and you get the exact spec you ask for. So when problems happen people on sight look at a part and say “that should of never broke” and that is reported. After the investigation 5-10 years down the road it is almost always reveled it was not engineered right.
  Report Post »
- go2mikerenzi
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 11:38am
  @DNEWTON.. the roof falls in and all the lights stay on.. no circuit breakers tripped? faulty building construction AND faulty wiring.. let semi-morons build the next one
  Report Post »
Baddoggy
Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:07am
New building collapse? You mean our GOVERNMENT INSPECTORS did not save us from this?? That is impossible! A Government inspection could not have allowed this to happen!
It does however look like the new Government stimulus package is working. They will need another building and that will create jobs!..
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- NOTAMUSHROOM
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:10am
  Doggie
  It was in Slovakia. But never fear, the incompetence is coming soon to a country near you!
  Report Post »
- Baddoggy
  Posted on January 29, 2012 at 9:15am
  Ha…I just read NHL and kids…I thought the roof looked kinda old school Soviet Union construction…my bad…
  Report Post »

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