When two aerial walkways collapsed at the Kansas City Hyatt Regency in 1981, 110 people were killed and more than 200 injured. Immediately after the accident, Exponent engineers were called to the scene. We conducted extensive onsite analysis and built a sophisticated computer model to load the bridge in the way that it was actually loaded at the time of the collapse. Our team determined that the collapse stemmed from a poorly fabricated connection between the supporting steel rods from which the walkways were hung and the structural beams that formed the floor of the walkway.

Civil/Structural Engineering
Materials/Metallurgy
Mechanical Engineering