Update: 29th April 2012
The progress at Sangkhola school is slow but strong. The slow progress is largely due to non-availability of qualified workforce which can work with Reinforced Cement Concrete (RCC ) as a construction material. The State Education Department has also expressed its desire to construct new buildings using RCC only, and is keen that the work is completed at its earliest. It is well understood and established that the damage during this earthquake has been primarily due to badly retained earth, retaining walls, and inadequate designing, especially of RCC joints. In many cases the soil wasn’t properly compacted; in some cases soil has been just dumped from other places in creating levelled land and is therefore very loose, and retaining walls were inadequate for the soil and therefore the building they were supporting. Due to the insufficient loose foundation soil, the structures underwent more shaking and resulted in greater damage despite Sikkim’s buildings having relatively good construction quality. Inadequate attention to design therefore seemed to be an important reason for the extensive damage caused by the earthquake.
The progress at Sangkhola school is slow but strong. The slow progress is largely due to non-availability of qualified workforce which can work with Reinforced Cement Concrete (RCC ) as a construction material. The State Education Department has also expressed its desire to construct new buildings using RCC only, and is keen that the work is completed at its earliest. It is well understood and established that the damage during this earthquake has been primarily due to badly retained earth, retaining walls, and inadequate designing, especially of RCC joints. In many cases the soil wasn’t properly compacted; in some cases soil has been just dumped from other places in creating levelled land and is therefore very loose, and retaining walls were inadequate for the soil and therefore the building they were supporting. Due to the insufficient loose foundation soil, the structures underwent more shaking and resulted in greater damage despite Sikkim’s buildings having relatively good construction quality. Inadequate attention to design therefore seemed to be an important reason for the extensive damage caused by the earthquake.
Now, with a revised project plan we are
expecting foundation work to complete by mid May; and structural skeleton with
other finishing works envisaged to complete by the middle of June. See pictures
of the foundation work here, where present emphasis is on preparing highly compacted foundation trenches
to support RCC column pedestals.
We are
looking at building the local contractor's competency in both technical and
managerial aspects of construction. This made us put more experienced
engineering team on the ground with Rakesh from SEEDS in the lead now along
with the mason Ramesh from Patanka village in Gujarat, to facilitate the
re-construction of the school.
***
In addition,
preparations are underway for reconstruction of the damaged buildings in three
school campuses in the East district of Sikkim. We are additionally looking at
overall Life Safety in these school campuses for future
extreme events, and improvement of the local built environment of through awareness building and community participation exercises.
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