The Kuala Terengganu Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin stadium roof collapse, one and the half years on

The Terengganu's Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin roof collapsed on 2 June 2009. That morning when the roof collapsed, I received an MMS from my good friend in KT. I could not believe what I saw but I vividly remembered my first thought was Thank God Almighty there was no event held at the stadium then. 


If there was a sports event, the roof collapse would have killed and injured many people and would become a great tragedy(refer here).

The Sultan Mizan Stadium seats 50,000 people at full capacity, the roof which collapsed would have caused death and injuries that is simply too much to bear

There have been much going ons in the way of investigations but not much for public consumption on a public interest matter such as these. This was a news report on 10 March 2010 attributed to Bernama:


Failure in meeting specifications led to stadium roof collapse


KUALA TERENGGANU: The failure by all parties appointed to build the Sultan Mizan Zainal Abidin Stadium (SSMZA) to adhere to specifications stated in the building contract has been cited as the reason for the collapse of its roof on June 2, last year.

Terengganu Menteri Besar Datuk Ahmad Said said the investigation report on the the incident found that all parties had contributed to the collapse of the SSMZA roof.

"No single party was found to be totally responsible. Everyone is (guilty). All parties contributed to the collapse of the roof of the stadium," he said when disclosing the report on the investigation on Wednesday March 10.

According to the Investigations Committee, Ahmad said the main cause of the collapse was that the components used and work quality did not meet specifications, the design was not suitable and the roof was not constructed properly.

He said quality control was not carried out at the project site and the weak supervision during the construction process as well as the lack of skilled workers had also contributed to the collapse.

In addition, Ahmad said the shortage of experts and experienced consultants as well as the apathy of everyone involved could also be blamed for the incident.

Meanwhile, when asked whether a notice had been issued to the contractor concerned to repair the stadium, Ahmad said: "The contractor had been informed and we have issued a notice to the contractor to repair (the stadium), but (to date) there is still no reply". As there had been no response to the notice issued to the main contractor, he said the tender to clean the debris from the collapsed roof would be issued this week at the latest.
-- Bernama


This is another article from Lembaga Arkitek Malaysia December 2010: TERENGGANU STADIUM ROOF COLLAPSE AND THE ARCHITECT’S RESPONSIBILITY that could shed some light on the investigations that are going on. 

Anyway, yesterday 31 January 2011, an Engineer was charged with posing as a qualified checker to deceive former state Public Works Department director Rosli Zainal and former state secretary Mokhtar Nong. Its all well and good that the Government is looking at the Stadium collapse with the seriousness that it deserved but many questions remains to be answered:

1. The stadium roof have two main sections, the section which collapsed has been cleared but what happen to the other opposite roof section, it is of the same design so is it safe or will it be demolished as well, the above Bernama report said that  "the main cause of the collapse was that the components used and work quality did not meet specifications, the design was not suitable and the roof was not constructed properly."

2. Whilst the Checking Engineer has been charged in court, what happened to the original design and build contractor, I think the Contractor has to take responsibility for the failure as for sure the roof design and construction must have some sort of warranty to last many years.

3. What happens if the design and build contractor refuses to take responsibility? What will the Government option be since the contractor is based overseas.

4. What recommendations have the "investigative committee"  made to ensure that this disaster will not happen again. Remember this time we were lucky that nobody was killed. The next time, God forbid, we would not be so lucky.

I think that the Government should look into the possibility for calling a RCI to investigate the stadium roof collapse to ensure that these kind of major structural failure do not happen again. Remember we were very lucky on 2nd June 2009.

Unfortunately, the Iranians were not so lucky:

7th. May 2001, Mottaqi Stadium, Iran, roof collapse injured more than 200 and killed 2 people. read here.