Dislodged sunshade at Tampines St 23 was missing reinforcement bars: BCA

SINGAPORE — A concrete sunshade that became dislodged at Block 201E Tampines Street 23 in September has been found to be the only one in the vicinity missing reinforcement bars, following checks by the authorities.

Further investigations are underway to determine whether building regulations were flouted when the sunshades were built, the Building and Construction Authority (BCA) said on Sunday (Dec 4) in response to TODAY’s queries.

BCA said in a press release that investigations by a professional engineer have confirmed that the side of the sunshade that dislodged had no reinforcement bars. The engineer “concluded that the sunshade dislodged because of the way it was constructed and not due to structural design”, BCA added.

In the Sept 25 incident, the sunshade on the fourth floor of Block 201E got dislodged and ended up resting on the sunshade on the third floor. No injuries were reported.

The BCA directed the Tampines Town Council to engage a professional engineer to carry out a detailed investigation.The engineer’s final investigation report, submitted on Nov 21, concluded that all the other existing sunshades at the block and surrounding blocks are safe, said BCA.

Ultrasound scanning checks by an independent accredited testing laboratory showed that reinforcement bars were detected in all other sunshades at Block 201E and surrounding blocks. “To further verify the findings from the ultrasound checks, the PE (professional engineer), in the presence of BCA engineers, carried out sampling checks by removing a strip of concrete cover to expose the rebars to establish the number and size of rebars. These checks confirmed that the existing sunshades are adequately supported on the columns and are safe,” said BCA, which also conducted an assessment of the findings and concurred with the engineer’s conclusions.