Concerns grow over 'boneless' apartments with insufficient rebar

Concerns grow over 'boneless' apartments with insufficient rebar. January. 24, 2025 08:15. .
After the collapse of an underground parking lot in Incheon's Geomdan New City apartment complex two years ago in April, the government conducted a major investigation and found many columns with less rebar in apartments that had been declared "free of poor construction." In some cases, the columns were designed to contain eight longitudinal bars to support the ceiling, but only four, half the number, were actually inside. In one case, a resident of an apartment complex in Gyeonggi Province, who did not trust the government's investigation, took it upon himself to look at the building plans and find missing rebar in the parking garage ceiling.

When they inquired at the Korea Authority of Land & Infrastructure Safety under the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, the staff in charge dismissed it as a "simple mistake." In another case, an official at the level of the director in charge of approving the completion of an apartment building in a local government gave a ridiculous response, "It didn't collapse like the Geomdan apartment.”

The Dong-A Ilbo Hero Content Team examined the construction status of 288 completed apartments of the same structure as those the government investigated after the 'Boneless Apartment Parking Lot' accident. They had obtained design plans for these apartments. Using the same equipment the government's investigation team used, the team found that in the 850 columns in parking lots in 21 complexes, rebar was missing from 25 columns in nine complexes. In many cases, one side of a square post was missing one or two bars when it should have had four or five.

A ministry report obtained by the team also listed cases of missing rebar and concrete strength below legal safety standards. However, the government announced in late October that "there were no defects such as missing rebar." The government decided that construction was not considered poorly done if there were no major defects in the rebar that connected the columns and the ceiling and floor, which caused the Geomdan accident. The government shortened the investigation period to two months, which would have taken four months, and excluded missing longitudinal rebar from the investigation, creating a decisive loophole in the safety inspection.

Experts warn that poorly constructed underground parking lots can collapse if a water-filled fire truck passes over them. According to a simulation conducted by the team with the assistance of a structural design firm, a 30-story apartment building constructed with the proper amount of rebar could withstand the 2017 Pohang earthquake for more than 60 seconds. However, an apartment building with only half the required rebar collapsed in just seven seconds.

Ultimately, government haste and bureaucratic moderation resulted in a superficial investigation. In recent years, soaring labor and cement costs have pressured builders to cut corners, likely leading to an increase in shoddy construction. The government's lack of rigorous scrutiny, driven more by a desire to minimize the impact of accidents than to improve overall apartment safety, is a growing concern for the public.