His explanation of the collapse is in harmony with an unreleased report by an engineer with the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration who reportedly discovered that 81 beams supporting the 16th floor were not up to code and dozens of them were “grossly undersized.” “And that indicates that the 16th floor failed and the other floors just came down with it.” “You can see where the two upper floors are moving kind of together rather than individually,” Walter Zehner said of the video. He said footage revealed that the building’s steel failed at the 16th floor of the 18-story structure, a fact that may play a key role in holding someone accountable for the collapse.
This week, Zehner pointed to video of the deadly disaster as the source of his new information.
The news outlet says Walter Zehner was hired by the owner of the Hard Rock project, 1031 Canal Development, to serve as a technical spokesman. NEW ORLEANS - This week, a structural engineer who helped demolish New Orleans' partially collapsed Hard Rock Hotel in 2020 provided officials with updated information on the cause of the building's collapse, according to WWL-TV.
