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The Sampoong Department Store collapse ((朝鮮語:삼풍백화점 붕괴 사고)) was a structural failure that occurred on June 29, 1995, in the Seocho-gu district of Seoul, South Korea. The collapse is the largest peacetime disaster in South Korean history as 502 people died and 937 were injured. It was the deadliest modern building collapse until the September 11 attacks in New York City, and the deadliest non-terror-related building collapse until the 2013 Savar building collapse near Dhaka, Bangladesh. ==Background== The Sampoong Group, a South Korean trade company, began construction of the Sampoong Department Store in 1987 over a tract of land previously used as a landfill. Originally designed as a residential apartment with four floors, it was changed to a large department store during its construction by the future chairman of the building, Lee Joon. This involved cutting away a number of support columns in order to install escalators. When the original contractors refused to carry out these changes, Lee ignored their warnings and fired them, instead using his own building company to complete construction. The building was completed in late 1989, and the Sampoong Department Store opened to the public on July 7, 1990, attracting an estimated 40,000 people per day during the building's five years of existence. The store consisted of north and south wings, connected by an atrium. A fifth floor was originally planned to house a skating rink; it was added later to comply with zoning regulations that prevented the entire building from being used as a department store. However, Lee changed the plan for the fifth floor to include eight restaurants instead. When a construction company tasked to complete the extension advised that the structure would not support another floor, they were fired, and another company was hired to complete the project. Because patrons sit on the floor of traditional Korean restaurants, the restaurant floor had a heated concrete base referred to as ondol, which has hot water pipes going through it. This greatly increased the weight and thickness of the concrete slab. In addition, the building's air conditioning unit was installed on the roof, creating a load that was four times the design limit. Two years before the collapse, the air conditioning units were moved across the delicate roof, which is where the cracking started. The units were moved over the column 5E from which the most visible cracks in the floor of the fifth level were seen before the collapse. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Sampoong Department Store collapse」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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