Balcony collapsed in Angers: five construction professionals sent back to correctional
Batirama.com 06/10/20210
Five construction professionals will be tried in February before the Angers criminal court, five years after the collapse of a balcony in Angers which left four dead and fourteen injured.
The correctional referral order was issued on September 29, confirming information from the local press. The trial is scheduled to start on February 9, 2022 in Angers for a period of three weeks. “We estimate that we could have around sixty people who would constitute civil parties”, indicated the prosecutor of Angers Éric Bouillard.
Among those summoned to appear are the head of the construction company (72 years old), the foreman (52 years old), the site manager (63 years old), the architect (65 years old) and the representative of the audit office Apave (83 years old). All have clean criminal records.
On the evening of October 15, 2016, 18 young people had fallen into the void when the balcony on the 4th floor of the "Le Surcourf" residence in the city center of Angers collapsed. In its fall of more than 8 meters, the balcony had dragged down the two balconies on the lower floors. Four of the victims, three men aged 21, 23 and 25, as well as an 18-year-old girl, had been killed.
Fourteen had been injured. The tragedy occurred during a housewarming party organized by two young girls, bringing together around thirty friends, the majority of whom were law students.
Collapse of a balcony on the 4th floor of a residence in the city center of Angers
The instruction made it possible to remove all responsibility from the students in the occurrence of the tragedy, the latter having not exhibited particularly dangerous behavior on a balcony supposed to be able to accommodate 35 people. Numerous defects during the construction of the building in 1997-1998 were, on the other hand, revealed by the legal expertise: bad position of the load-bearing steels having created a serious weakness of the structure, resumption of non-conforming concreting, evacuation system of the unrealized waters, etc.
In addition, the balcony slabs, which were initially to be prefabricated, were finally cast on site, without any new plans being made. The works supervisor explained during the investigation that this choice had been made to save time by 14 weeks.
The architect, also project manager, is criticized for not having ensured plans adapted to the method of construction of the balconies and for not having followed the site sufficiently. As for Apave's business manager, he did not issue any unfavorable opinion, did not suspend the progress of the work or raise any irregularity when he should have realized that the balconies had not been built according to the plans, estimated the investigating judges.
The Angers Court of Appeal rejected in May 2021 a request for an additional investigation into a possible lack of maintenance of the balcony, which aimed to involve the syndic of co-ownership of the building
Source: batirama.com
