In the hospitality industry, facilities are omnipresent and serve as the backbone of all our operations. They facilitate various activities ranging from hosting events and preparing meals to providing comfortable accommodations for guests. Furthermore, they support behind-the-scenes tasks that ensure the smooth functioning of the hotel. Within the hospitality industry, facilities encompass a wide range of spaces including hotel rooms, restaurants, meeting and convention areas, parking garages, and recreational facilities such as pools, spas, waterparks, and gyms. Additionally, they encompass essential equipment like stoves, fryers, washers, and dryers, as well as the building infrastructure that houses vital elements such as water, gas, electricity, and structural components.
Why Preventive Maintenance Matters:
It is crucial to maintain, repair, and design our facilities correctly; otherwise, the consequences can be disastrous. When we fail to do so, we often see disasters like fires, building collapses, gas leaks, power failures, floods, and more severe natural disasters occur. While most of the time we have control over weather-related disasters, there are cases when we have zero control over disasters happening. Such cases include natural events like earthquakes, hurricanes, forest fires, and tornadoes.
It is crucial to prioritize the prevention of disasters by exercising meticulous control. One effective approach is to employ preventive and corrective maintenance strategies, carefully examining blueprints during the design phase to eliminate any critical errors. Moreover, seeking advice from experts during the maintenance and design processes ensures adherence to best practices.
By neglecting the aforementioned maintenance practices or neglecting to review the blueprints, it can lead to significant catastrophes and endanger the lives of innocent individuals and nearby properties. As we shall observe through various examples, a majority of the disasters documented could have been prevented had proper maintenance been conducted, blueprints been reevaluated prior to commencing construction, and appropriate safety measures been implemented.
Hotel Fires:
Facilities fires in the hospitality industry are a disaster that can be controlled with proper measures. Neglecting maintenance, emergency procedures, or safety equipment can lead to dire consequences. Fires occur when there is an ignition source, fuel, and oxygen. In the context of a hotel room, where numerous flammable sources can be found, items such as towels, sheets, blankets, desks, curtains, and furniture can easily fan the flames and escalate the situation to a point of no return.
So, when a fire occurs in a hotel, it is crucial that our fire safety plan and equipment are effective and efficient in aiding during an emergency. The most important elements of a fire safety plan include, fire detection followed by fire notification. Fire detection includes human observation, heat detectors, photoelectric smoke detectors, ionization smoke detectors and sprinkler systems. Meanwhile fire notification includes emergency instructions and floor plans, building horns/alarms, voice alarms, visual alarms, communication systems, and smoke detectors. Additionally, if a fire does break out, fire control is very important and includes the following smoke dampers which inhibit the movement of smoke through ductwork, smoke sensors that control smoke dampers and a stairwell pressurization system that increase the air pressure in stairwells keeping them relatively smoke free.
MGM Grand Fire:
Looking back to 1980, the MGM Grand Fire was the deadliest hotel fire ever to occur. According to several reports and investigations, it was found the fire began around 7:10 a.m. Upon further investigation, it was discovered that the casino floor did not have sprinklers or any fire suppression systems which ultimately caused the entire casino floor to be ravaged by fire in six minutes (Fascinating Horror, 2021). It was also found that as fire and smoke quickly rose up the hotel tower, no early warning systems were present and fire alarms or safety systems were not functioning to warn guests before it was too late. By the time the guests in the tower found out there was a fire, it was too late which caused many to be trapped in their rooms and on the upper floors of the tower cut off from exits entirely. This disaster unfortunately took the lives of 87 people and injured more than 600 (Verastigue, 2022).
To begin with, this disaster could have been avoided if the bakery case that caused the fire was maintained properly. If there was preventative maintenance being done, perhaps the (reason case sparked) could have been spotted and fixed. Additionally, had there been proper fire detection, warning and suppression systems, the fire could have been contained sooner and tragedy could have been prevented.
Building & Facilities Collapses:
While we have control over fires and the outcomes in our facilities, unfortunately when collapses occur, we tend to have less control over them due to the fact that most problems that cause collapses occur in the design and construction stages. If we are the ones designing and constructing the facilities, we have control over collapses. Whereas if we are utilizing an existing facility, we will not have control over the design of the facility and its infrastructure. Most collapses can be prevented if blueprints, designs and technical drawings are checked again before going to the construction phase. It’s when we fail to do this simple yet easily overlooked step, that we see incredible building collapses as results of engineering failures.
Hard Rock New Orleans Collapse:
Unfortunately for the under construction Hard Rock New Orleans, they learned this mistake the hard way after it was too late. It was a beautiful and normal day just like any other day until tragedy struck and Hard Rock came crashing down onto the street below. Work was being done on the upper floors where concrete was being poured for supports as well as the structure making up the floor. Additionally, work was being done on the 18th floor where the pool was hoisted up by crane only hours before. Suddenly without notice, the under construction hotel collapsed killing three workers, and injuring hundreds both on the job site and street below. Immediately, the public demanded answers as to why the hotel collapsed and the cause of the incident.
In the aftermath of the incident, it was discovered by OSHA that the engineer “failed to adequately design, review or approve steel bolt connections affecting the structural integrity of the building” (OSHA, 2019). Additionally, Walter Zehner, a technical spokesman and structural engineer commented “You can see where the two upper floors are moving kind of together rather than individually and that indicates that the 16th floor failed and the other floors just came down with it” (Hammer, 2021). It was found the building was so un-structurally sound that many of the steel beams were overstressed by 300%.
Hyatt Regency Lobby Collapse:
Sadly, a similar tragedy occurred at 1981 Hyatt Regency Hotel in Kansas City where an elevated walkway collapsed, killing 114 people and injuring 200 more. The lobby area featured a three tiered elevated walkway that took guests across the resort to different meeting spaces and guest areas. During an investigation launched directly after the incident, it was found that a change in the original design of a series of walkways suspended above the lobby’s hotel led to a connection failure. The original design had all of the walkways suspended from the ceiling with steel rods retained by nuts. Even prior to the design change, the original design only supported 60% of the minimum load required by the Kansas City Building Code. The contractor responsible for manufacturing the steel rods objected to the use of threaded steel rods, as they felt the threads would be damaged during construction. They proposed an alternative plan where the lowest platform would be supported on one end by the ceiling, but on the other end by an upper level platform. This of course left the upper level platform, already under-designed, with a double load (Tyrell, 2020). Much like the Hard Rock incident that occurred recently, this incident in 1981, could have also been prevented by simply double checking blueprints, designs and technical drawings before starting the construction process.
Tropicana Parking Garage Collapse:
Similarly, back in October 2003, the Tropicana Casino and Resort in Atlantic City also had a collapse. During a major expansion and renovation project, the resort was constructing a new parking garage to be able to hold the higher capacity of guests entering the resort. Unfortunately, while constructing the parking garage, it collapsed in on itself, killing four construction workers and injuring 21 others (OSHA, 2004). It was also discovered during the investigation that multiple reasons were to blame for the collapse. First, the contractor building the garage did not properly support the structure in areas where the concrete was being poured and cast for the supports. Secondly, it was found that the parking garage levels were beginning to show signs of cracking around major support columns and areas that were just freshly poured a week to a few days prior. “The Fabi superintendent failed to seek the immediate attention of the general contractor/construction manager or the structural engineer of record when Fabi employees brought to his attention the cracks around the exterior columns on grid line 1 at levels P4 thru P7. The employees noticed consistent cracks at the interior long face of the columns extending at an angle of forty-five degrees towards the edge of the slab/beam. These cracks should not have been dismissed as shrinkage cracks because of their uniformity, depth, and pattern on all levels. The collapse could have been averted if immediate attention was sought” (OSHA, 2004).
Much like the previous two incidents resulting in collapses, this incident also could have been prevented if the blueprints and technical drawings were double-checked for design flaws prior to construction starting. Additionally, had the engineer stopped to address the reported cracks and flaws that were discovered, the incident could have also been prevented by performing the proper work to address the issues and stop them from becoming more severe.
Final Thoughts:
To conclude, it is crucial that we maintain, repair, and design our facilities correctly; otherwise, the consequences can be disastrous. Our facilities in a hotel include hotel rooms, restaurants, meeting & convention spaces, parking garages, recreational areas like pools, spas, waterparks, and gyms, equipment such as stoves, fryers, washers, and dryers, and even the infrastructure of the building. When we fail to take proper steps and do maintenance, we often see disasters like fires, building collapses, gas leaks, power failures, floods, and more severe natural disasters occur. Most disasters we have full control over before they even become disasters. We can prevent disasters through preventive and corrective maintenance, cross-checking blueprints during the design stages to ensure no crucial errors were made, and consulting with experts when doing maintenance or design to ensure we are doing it correctly.
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