Any geotechnical engineer – Dirt Doctor to some – worth his weight in soil could have predicted what was going to happen to a building near a four-story deep excavation. This was an excavation at the University of British Columbia Okanagan campus in Kelowna, B.C. That’s about 40 feet deep – a big hole!
The excavation was dug for construction of a 43 story high-rise and four-level underground parkade. Eighty-four (84) tenants were evacuated from one building near the excavation, the Hadgraft Wilson Place because of potential collapse. Problems developed over months as the excavation got deeper including bricks falling…
