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The Canterbury Television building -
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A CTV broadcaster says the release of a report into the failings of the CTV building has brought back the "horror and terror" of the day that 16 of his friends and colleagues lost their lives.
Rob Cope-Williams was lucky not to be in the six-storey CTV building which claimed 115 lives when it was flattened in the February 22 quake and subsequently caught fire.
The CTV collapse was responsible for more than half of the victims of the 6.3 magnitude quake, which killed 184 people in total.
A report by the Department of Building and Housing blames weak and brittle columns for the building pancaking in the earthquake.
Cope-Williams told TV ONE's Breakfast that there is still a long way to go, but the report does bring some closure.
"I think it is going to quietly take us to some sort of a closure," he said.
"The questions people ask themselves at two in the morning when they're lying awake, it's really going to be able to put it to rest."
He said every one of the 11 survivors and the families of those who were lost will have their own thoughts and emotions.
"I think the hardest thing for everybody involved - for the families and those who survived - is that it brings all that terror and horror back and we've got to go through that process."
"But the most terrifying thing really is that we were all working in a building that nobody knew was totally unsafe."
He said he would like to see it go through a judicial process so that it never happens again.
"If there is blame and there is accountability let's see justice done."
Investigation launched
The Government will investigate buildings throughout the country to see if any have similar characteristics to the CTV building.
The Department of Building and Housing report found the CTV building did not comply with the building code when it was first built in 1986.
Building and Construction Minister Williamson told TV ONE's Breakfast attributing any liability has been passed onto to the police and the Royal Commission of Inquiry. He said the report indicates that there were failing on all levels.
"We did owe it to those families to find that out and we owe it to a whole lot of other people across New Zealand who are working in similar type buildings to ensure whether those buildings are safe," he said.
About 352 buildings between 1982 and 1985 have been identified as having that standard and Williamson said half have been checked and passed through. Some have been identified as requiring further investigation.
"It's terribly concerning that we have a proper process and Christchurch City Council is one of the factors in here - they're supposed to check that...the code of compliance meets whatever the building code of the day was."
President of the Structural Engineering Society of New Zealand, John Hare said buildings constructed around the same time as the CTV building could have the same issue with unsafe columns.
Police will investigate the report on behalf of the department to see whether there is any criminal negligence in regards to the construction of the building.
Assistant Commissioner Malcolm Burgess says a large volume of information has been handed to them.
The building's owners, Madras Equities, say it would be inappropriate to comment until the Royal Commission of Inquiry into the earthquakes formally meets to hear evidence.
The Institute of Structural Engineers is also looking into the report to see if there are any disciplinary measures it needs to take as a result.
Causes of collapse
The report has found the CTV structure failed to meet three 1986 building standards, and the building collapsed due to three causes: Intense horizontal ground shaking; a lack of flexibility in its supporting columns making them brittle; and the asymmetrical layout of the shear or structural walls, making the building twist excessively.
David Hopkins, from the independent panel of experts convened for the report, said the building's supporting columns were vulnerable to the lateral movement created in the earthquake.
He said the movement experienced in the February quake was unprecedented and caused the columns to move 90% more than the building code was prepared for. And the asymmetrical design also caused it to twist more than other buildings.
Hopkins said the most likely cause of the collapse would have been the failure of the eastern wall, one of its main supports, which subsequently put greater pressure on the columns beneath it.
Failing under the greater weight, the lower columns broke and the building collapsed from the bottom up.
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