30 years ago in KC, 114 killed at tea dance

New Posts

wfgodot

wfgodot

Former Member
Joined
Mar 4, 2009
Messages
30,166
Reaction score
722
One of the least-remembered recent national tragedies: 30 years ago today.

The Hyatt Regency disaster is "forever part of Kansas City's story."

Thirty years after the Hyatt skywalks disaster, a reminder to never forget
Thirty years ago today the music stopped when the skywalks in the elegant Hyatt Regency hotel lobby suddenly crashed down on a crowd of people enjoying big-band tunes and a night out.

The 114 people killed in the disaster will never age. The injured, the victims’ loved ones and the rescuers, however, are three decades older.

Over that long a span, anger and grief can recede, but they can also harden into a resolve to make sure that the calamity is never forgotten.
---
Click to expand...
Huge article at Kansas City Star link above.
 
thanks for posting this article; i'll read it.

i watched a documentary on this once and it was just terrifying.
 
I also watched a documentary about the tragedy. It's sad how it claimed so many lives, wasn't even that long ago, yet it is barely mentioned anymore. "Least remembered recent national tragedy" is unfortunately very accurate.

Here's another website about it: http://skywalk.kansascity.com/
 
At the time, I was teaching in a small town a couple hours southwest of KC; usually, I'd go up there a couple times a month, generally arriving Friday evening and staying with friends through Sunday.

I didn't go up that week, but do remember buying the then-morning paper - the Kansas City Times - the next day, and wincing whilst reading the bold front-page headlines regarding the disaster. I still have that newspaper.
 
Oh my! Has it been 30 years since that happened? :eek: I shouldn't be old enough to remember 30 year old news events. That was so awful. All those people there at a lovely hotel, to have a good time dancing. Ugh! tragic.

There is a group raising money for a memorial to the victims:

The group today has raised about $350,000 of the $800,000 it needs for a memorial and an endowment, and has both a site and approvals from both Hyatt and the hotel's owner - Hallmark Cards, the Star says.
Click to expand...

http://travel.usatoday.com/hotels/post/2011/07/hyatt-kansas-city-skywalk-collapse-30th-anniversary/177240/1

F03W.St.81.jpg
http://media.kansascity.com/smedia/2011/07/16/20/30/F03W.St.81.jpg
 
I remember the Hyatt. People were talking how much fun the tea dances were. We had considered going, but then hubby and I were laid up from a motorcycle wreck. Glad we didn't get to go. I remember an acquaintance saying how scary it was to be on the walkways and how much they swayed, this was before the tragedy.

Fortunately none of my friends or acquaintances were killed or injured, but a few had family members who helped in the clean up. One thought a woman was alive when the crane lifted up a concrete slab because she sat upright. Turns out the womans head was smashed to the slab and it lifted her up. Horrible! A lot of rescuers and clean up people had a hard time coping with the carnage they saw for a long time.
 
Show Me said:
I remember the Hyatt. People were talking how much fun the tea dances were. We had considered going, but then hubby and I were laid up from a motorcycle wreck. Glad we didn't get to go. I remember an acquaintance saying how scary it was to be on the walkways and how much they swayed, this was before the tragedy.

Fortunately none of my friends or acquaintances were killed or injured, but a few had family members who helped in the clean up. One thought a woman was alive when the crane lifted up a concrete slab because she sat upright. Turns out the womans head was smashed to the slab and it lifted her up. Horrible! A lot of rescuers and clean up people had a hard time coping with the carnage they saw for a long time.
Click to expand...

BBM:

I can only imagine! I'll bet there are images that those people will never quit seeing in there minds. I think it was the 2nd and 4th floor walkways that collapsed. The tons of concrete and steel falling and sandwiching the victims would have been devastating. :( Luckily, you and your friends were unharmed.
 
I remember this vividly-hearing about it in the news, talking about it with my mom. It is one of the things that's always in my head when I'm on a walkway that sways or in a place where too many people are at one time. God bless all those poor souls! It certainly freaked me out-and I wasn't even there.
 
Show Me said:
I remember the Hyatt. People were talking how much fun the tea dances were. We had considered going, but then hubby and I were laid up from a motorcycle wreck. Glad we didn't get to go. I remember an acquaintance saying how scary it was to be on the walkways and how much they swayed, this was before the tragedy.

Fortunately none of my friends or acquaintances were killed or injured, but a few had family members who helped in the clean up. One thought a woman was alive when the crane lifted up a concrete slab because she sat upright. Turns out the womans head was smashed to the slab and it lifted her up. Horrible! A lot of rescuers and clean up people had a hard time coping with the carnage they saw for a long time.
Click to expand...

Is it normal for a walkway to sway? Did they make them more stable after the tragedy? When they did their investigation, did they find that the swaying was a reason why it collapsed? That doesn't sound safe at all.
 
A friend and classmate of my husband who is a physician and his wife (a nurse) were just arriving at the Hyatt that evening for a dinner with a group of his office colleagues. They were literally parking their car as the walkways collapsed and walked up to the entry door as the first survivors came running out! Needless to say, they spent the rest of the evening helping triage patients onto busses and ambulances rather than getting to enjoy the dinner that they had planned!
 
raeann said:
A friend and classmate of my husband who is a physician and his wife (a nurse) were just arriving at the Hyatt that evening for a dinner with a group of his office colleagues. They were literally parking their car as the walkways collapsed and walked up to the entry door as the first survivors came running out! Needless to say, they spent the rest of the evening helping triage patients onto busses and ambulances rather than getting to enjoy the dinner that they had planned!
Click to expand...

thank god they were there to help, they were probably some of the first "responders" on the scene, intended or not!
 
eileenhawkeye said:
Is it normal for a walkway to sway? Did they make them more stable after the tragedy? When they did their investigation, did they find that the swaying was a reason why it collapsed? That doesn't sound safe at all.
Click to expand...

There were way too many people on the walkways and the walkways were suspended also I believe.
 
Show Me said:
There were way too many people on the walkways and the walkways were suspended also I believe.
Click to expand...

It was actually an engineering mistake.

This design change would prove fatal. In the original design, the beams of the fourth floor walkway had to support only the weight of the fourth floor walkway itself, with the weight of the second floor walkway supported completely by the rods. In the revised design, however, the fourth floor beams were required to support both the fourth floor walkway and the second floor walkway hanging from it. With the load on the fourth-floor beams doubled, Havens' proposed design could bear only 30 percent of the mandated minimum load (as opposed to 60 percent for the original design).
Click to expand...

Hyatt Regency walkway collapse - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
Show Me said:
Thanks Tuffy! Not long after it happened I watched a special explaining why the walkways fell....I can't remember the details after all these years. :waitasec:

But I do remember people saying they were not comfortable at all on the walkways and worried when too many people were on them and they swayed.
Click to expand...

I would love to see that doc about the collapse. I remember when it happened & then we studied the failure in an architectural engineering class.... We do not give it much thought, but everyday put ourselves at the mercy of someone who calculated buildings' reliability.
 
I don't know why I don't remember this at all, since I usually pay attention to things like this. I was in college then and working that summer rather than taking classes, so maybe I just didn't watch the news all that much?

I'm glad to see they're going to build a memorial to remember those who lost their lives in this tragedy.
 
Show Me said:
There were way too many people on the walkways and the walkways were suspended also I believe.
Click to expand...

It wasn't only that, but everybody was dancing and swaying to the tempo and created the type of vibration that can bring a bridge down when troops are marching in unison across it. The weight and vibration were found to both be contributing factors in this.

A relative by marriage to me lost both of her parents in this. They were some of the nicest people I have ever met. She didn't even know that they went to it and only found out when she got the notification of their death. I guess they just found out about it from some friends and made a spur of the moment decision to go to it. It does sound like it would have been a fun event to attend if the tragedy didn't occur. :mad:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

DNASolves

Who is Escambia County John Doe (1989)?

Members online

... and 205 more.
Total: 3,782 (members: 206, guests: 3,576)

Online statistics

Members online
206
Guests online
3,576
Total visitors
3,782
Totals may include hidden visitors.

Forum statistics

Threads
591,750
Messages
17,958,402
Members
228,602
Latest member
jrak
Back
Top