Forensic Science International 217 (2012) 119–126

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Forensic Science International

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/forsciint

Inspection of collapse cause of Sampoong Department Store

Tae Won Park *
Department of Architectural Engineering, Dankook University, 126, Jukjeon-dong, Yongin-si, Gyeonggi-do 448-701, Republic of Korea

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Article history: On June 29, 1995, the Sampoong Department Store in Seoul, South Korea, completely collapsed. It was a
Received 19 August 2011 five story reinforced concrete (RC) building with underground 4 floors and was built using a technique
Received in revised form 15 October 2011 called ‘‘flat slab construction’’. The collapse is the largest peacetime disaster in South Korean history – 502
Accepted 19 October 2011
people died, 6 missing, and 937 sustained injuries. The Sampoong Department Store was completed in
Available online 10 November 2011
late 1989, and it opened to the public on July 7, 1990, attracting an estimated 40,000 people per day
during the building’s 5 years in service.
Keywords:
After the collapse, intense investigation was conducted to find out the direct causes of the collapse
Building collapse
through (1) survey on the present collapse situation and ground condition, (2) strength test of the
Flat slab
Structural design concrete and steel collected at the site, (3) design documents and construction/management reports, and
Construction (4) structural analysis. The investigation revealed that the Sampoong Department Store collapsed
because so many direct and indirect causes such as flaws in design phase and mistakes in construction
and management process were overlapped.
ß 2011 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction the future, we intended to suggest an approach to the technological

1.1. Accident outline
On June 29, 1995, a building of the Sampoong Department
Store, which had four basement floors and five floors above ground
in the area of 73,877 m2, collapsed down to the basement floor in a
split second, which left 502 persons dead, 6 persons missing and
937 persons injured and caused damage to property worth of KRW
100 billion or higher (the amount of the time when the accident
happened) [1]. The collapsed department building had the
structure of flat slab. The building had the flat slab system [2–5]
without beam and with slab directly supported by pillar. And it had
the structure that collapse of one pillar support led to breakdown
of an entire structure in a moment, which means a progress
collapse. Therefore, such structure requires a precise design and
construction. Even after construction is completed, such structure
requires a thorough maintenance.
This study covers only the technological aspect of investigation
on the reason for the collapse that was conducted after the accident
struck. We decided to review the accident that happened about 15
years ago because the results of the investigation on cause of
collapse were not announced. As the accident needs to be regarded
as a precedent for the case where a similar accident takes place in
aspect of structural engineering.
Furthermore, when the investigation was conducted, it was
difficult to secure evidence due to rescue work, fire prevention and
complete collapse. But we made an engineering analysis based on
building survey, foundation ground survey, review of design books,
and examination of information on construction and maintenance,
which aimed at taking the analysis results as a precedent for
prevention of a similar accident in the future.
1.2. Summary for collapsed structure
As shown in Fig. 1 [6], the department store consisted of the
building A that was used as a shopping center, the building B that
housed a sport center and business facilities, and the core that
connected the two buildings. The facilities in the department store
were operated as shown in Table 1. The collapsed structure was the
building A that was utilized as a shopping center that had sales
stores. The structure collapsed at the time when the building was
crowded with people, which resulted in the huge loss of people and
property.
2. Collapse
2.1. Before the collapse

Building structure has the life span of around 50 years. While

* Tel.: +82 31 8005 3754; fax: +82 31 8005 2643. the building structure is being used, it is required to conduct
E-mail addresses: tw001@dankook.ac.kr, tw001@daum.net. maintenance and retrofit on a regular basis. This can be expressed

0379-0738/$ – see front matter ß 2011 Elsevier Ireland Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.forsciint.2011.10.039
120 T.W. Park / Forensic Science International 217 (2012) 119–126

Fig. 1. Information of collapsed building.
in life cycle as shown in Fig. 2, which illustrates that performance
degradation of the structure and maintenance against the
degradation are repeated periodically. It is customary to set the
period of repair and retrofit at around 10 years primarily. But the
building in this case collapsed about 5 years after it was newly
built. Therefore, it is believed that the structure had failed to exert
its own function since the time when construction was completed.
Based on examination of the maintenance log and the statement by
people, it is possible to summarize the situation before the collapse
as follows.
According to records, there was water leakage, initiation of
crack in the width of 1 cm or larger, and falling of lighting
equipment in the period from the opening day of the department
store to the day of the collapse. Before the day of the collapse,
records say that a worker on duty listened to the noise generated as
reinforced bar got drawn out. The time table starting from the
moment that heralded the beginning of the collapse can be
summarized as follows.
In April 1995, cracks began to appear in the ceiling of the south
wing’s fifth floor. During this period, the only response carried out
by Lee and his management involved moving merchandise and
stores from the top floor to the basement.
On the morning of June 29, the number of cracks in the area
increased dramatically, prompting managers to close the top floor
and shut the air conditioning off. The store management failed to
shut the building down or issue formal evacuation orders, as the
number of customers in the building was unusually high, and the
store was not intending to lose potential revenue for that day.
However, the executives themselves had left the premises as a
precaution.
Civil engineering experts were also invited to inspect the
structure, with a cursory check revealing that the building was at
risk of collapse; the National Geographic documentary series
Seconds From Disaster indicates that the facility’s manager was
examining the slab in one of the restaurants on the fifth floor, 8 h
before the collapse, when, unknowingly, vibration from air
conditioning was radiating through the cracks in the concrete
columns and the floor opened up.
Five hours before the collapse, the first of several loud bangs
was emitted from the top floors, as the vibration in the air
conditioning caused the cracks in the slabs to widen further. Amid
customer reports of vibration, the air conditioning was turned off,
but the cracks in the floors had already widened to 10 cm.
At about 5:00 p.m. Korea Standard Time (UTC + 9:00), the
fourth floor ceiling began to sink, resulting in store workers
blocking customer access to the fourth floor. According to Seconds
From Disaster, the store was packed with shoppers 52 min before
the collapse, but the owner did not close the store or carry out
repairs at that time. When the building started to produce cracking
sounds at about 5:50 p.m., workers began to sound alarms and
evacuate the building, but by then it was too late.
Around 5:57 p.m., the roof gave way, and the air conditioning
unit crashed through into the already-overloaded fifth floor 1. The
main columns, weakened to allow the insertion of the escalators,
collapsed in turn, and the building’s south wing pancaked into the
basement. Within 20 s, all of the building’s columns in the south
wing gave way, trapping more than 1500 people and killing 502.
3. Investigation on cause of collapse
The investigation on the site of the collapse was very dangerous
and difficult but was very significant in that it was conducted to

Table 1
Summary and usage of building.

Building summary Usage

Name Sampoong Department Store 5th story Restaurant

Usage Shopping center 1st–4th story Clothing store
Location Seoul, South Korea 1st underground Food store
Size Four underground and five story, 73,877 m2 2nd underground Parking lot, storage
Open day 1/December/1989 3rd under Parking lot
Structure type Reinforced concrete flat slab system 4th under Machine room
 T.W. Park / Forensic Science International 217 (2012) 119–126 121

Fig. 2. Life cycle of building structure.

secure evidence and collect data for estimating the cause of the
collapse. In this case, the most urgent task was to clear the
remnants of the collapsed building in order to rescue people who
were buried in the remnants and recover the dead bodies.
Therefore, it was almost impossible to preserve the scene of the
accident for investigation. Instead, the scene was observed as it
was cleared away while materials were found in the remnants
removed from the scene to be used as evidence. And the cause of
the accident was analyzed in the engineering aspect. Fig. 3 shows
flow chart for inspection process.
3.1. General information
In general, building is constructed as architect and structural
engineer establish plan for building in a close cooperation between
them in the initial construction plan stage, put the plan into
drawing and carry out the construction. Particularly, in order to
secure safety of building, the architect and the structural designer
determine the basic details of structure planning such as interval
between pillars and structure type by making decision on scale of
building, number of floors, external appearance, and building use.
Then, the architect makes structural drawings, and the structural
designer performs structural calculation based on various condi-
tions given in the structural drawings by the architect. In this
process, the structural designer writes a structural calculation
document based on the calculation of proper standards for
structural members such as slab, pillar and foundation as well
as on the calculation of reinforced bar volume. And the structural
designer makes a structural drawing, too. However, the collapsed
building of the Sampoong Department Store had the design

Fig. 3. Flow chart of inspection for collapsed building.

122 T.W. Park / Forensic Science International 217 (2012) 119–126
Table 2
Design and real load of 5th floor.
Usage Design (kg/m2) Usage (kg/m2)
Roller skating rink Restaurant
Live load 240 500
Dead load 800 1030
Total load 1040 1530
changes continuously as a structural drawing was made. As a
result, it was often the case where the load, which is higher than
the one calculated by the structural engineer, was applied to the
structure. In addition, as the structural calculation was made by
the structural engineer and the structural drawing was made by
the architect, there was a fatal mistake that reinforced bar, which
was lower in volume than planned, was placed to some members.
This chapter summarized some mistakes and analyzed reduction
in safety factor that was given in the structural design.
3.2. Design changes on the 5th floor above ground
According to the initial drawings submitted for approval, the
5th floor above ground of the building was supposed to be used for
a roller-skating rink. The structural calculation document says that
the building was designed to take up the dead load of 800 kg/m2,
including the finishing material load of 60 kg/m2, and the live load
of 240 kg/m2, which adds up to the total working load of 1040 kg/
m2. Afterwards, the building was changed to be used for a
restaurant. Such change increased the load due to the kitchen that
included large electric refrigerators and was built with concrete for
slope. And the floors for the floor heating system and the walls for
partitioning were added anew, which was not planned initially.
This addition resulted in increase of the load by around 50% as
shown in Table 2. However, it is believed that there was no
reinforcement with members as the structural drawing of the 5th
floor was identical to those of the 2nd floor, the 3rd floor and the
4th floor according to the structural design drawings.
3.3. Moving the cooling tower
At the time of the building design, there was no consideration of
cooling facilities throughout the building. As the building
construction came to completion, the building was determined
to be used for an upscale shopping center. As a result, the cooling
Fig. 4. Moving trace of cooling tower without structural review.
system for the entire building was planned after the structural
drawings were made. The plan was to install the cooling tower on
the floor of the rooftop. The installation of the cooling tower
directly on the slab, which was not reflected in the structural
calculation document, added the excessive live load of 400 kg/m2
or more to the building. In addition, as shown in Fig. 4, the cooling
tower was installed toward the area of residential facilities, rather
than toward the street. As the cooling tower was put in operation,
people in nearby apartment houses started complaining that the
cooling tower caused noise and ruined the view in the neighbor-
hood. For this reason, the cooling tower was moved to the opposite
side of the building. In this case, the cooling tower was shifted by
installing rollers on plates to push and slide the tower for the
convenience of work, rather than selecting the method that could
minimize damage to the structure as much as possible. Conse-
quently, as shown in Fig. 4, the movement of the cooling tower
caused a structural damage to the building, especially around the
plates.
3.4. Standard for pillar and placement of reinforced bar
In the initial plan, the collapsed building was supposed to be
used for a common shopping mall. But as the construction was in
progress, the plan was changed to use the building as a high-class
shopping mall so that an escalator was installed in the center of the
collapsed building ‘‘A.’’ Consequently, the structural calculation
was performed again to express the four pillars in columns (5) and
(6) at the corner of the escalator with C1A (refer to Fig. 5) and the
four pillars in columns (8) and (9) with C1B. In regard to the size of
pillar from the 2nd floor to the 5th floor, the eight pillars of C1A and
C1B were composed of circular columns in the diameter of 80 cm
while 16 sets of reinforced bar in the diameter of 22 mm were
placed.
However, according to the structural drawings used for
construction, 16 pillars on the 4th floor and the 5th floor above
ground, among various pillars that were designed to be the
80 cm-diamter circular columns such as the pillars of C1A and
C1B, were replaced by 8 pillars in the diameter of 60 cm as a Fig. 6
that had reinforced bar in the diameter of 22 mm. Then, the
construction was performed just as the changes were made. This
shows that the cross-sectional area of 16 pillars in the two types
were reduced to around 56.3% of the cross-sectional area in the
structural calculation document with reinforced bar reduced to
50% (Table 3).
 T.W. Park / Forensic Science International 217 (2012) 119–126 123

Fig. 5. Unpermitted reduction of cross sectional area of column.

Fig. 6. Photo of reduction of cross sectional area of column.

3.5. Reinforced bar construction
Concrete has the high compression and the low tension while
reinforced bar is strong in tension. In consideration of these
features, reinforced bars are added to the part where the tension
force is applied in the process of designing a reinforced concrete
structure, which aims at ensuring that a structure is able to bear
the load applied from outside. In general, when gravity load is
applied, tension force and compression force are applied on flat
slab. To be specific, the tension force is applied to the upper part
of slab near pillar while the compression force is applied to the
lower part. Therefore, a structure is designed to withstand
tension force by adding reinforced bars to the upper part of slab
and compression force by adding mainly concrete to the lower
part.
One of the critical factors to calculate the tensile reinforced bar
volume is the distance from the concrete surface on the
compression part of slab to the center of tensile reinforced bar.
The distance is proportional to effective depth and determined by
stress of slab. Therefore, the reinforced bar volume is determined
according to the size of effective depth. As a result, on slab of pillar
and joint part, it is necessary to maintain the upper and tensile
reinforced bar in the exact location and to strengthen the bar to
ensure that bending is transferred completely.
The normal location of the upper and tensile reinforced bar on
slab or the distance from the concrete surface of the upper slab to
the center of the upper and tensile reinforced bar is approximately
4–5 cm, which combines around 3 cm of the cover thickness,
which extends from the concrete surface of the upper slab to the
surface of the reinforced bar, with half (1.1 cm) of the diameter
(22 mm) of reinforced bar. Therefore, if the cover thickness
increases to exceed 4–5 cm in the normal cover thickness of
reinforced bar, the stress of slab decreases as much as the increased
ratio of cover thickness/total effective depth, which is a primary
cause of structural problems
 
real position of reinforcement
R0 ¼
effective depth
ð15030Þ mm
¼ ¼ 0:4
300 mm

Table 3
Comparison of column between structural calculation and design.

Member Story Structural calculation Structural design Number

Diameter Reinforcement Diameter Reinforcement

C1A 4, 5 80 cm 16-HD22 60 cm 8-HD22 8

C1B 4, 5 80 cm 16-HD22 60 cm 8-HD22 8
124 T.W. Park / Forensic Science International 217 (2012) 119–126
Fig. 7. Reduction of effective depth on slab.
In case of reinforced bar in the diameter of 16 mm, the distance
was found to be around 10 cm from the concrete surface of the
upper flat slab on the 5th floor, which was joined by C1 (row (7)
and column (D)) pillar of the 4th floor and the 5th floor, to the
center of the upper and tensile reinforced bar. The reinforced bar in
the diameter of 22 mm, which is not shown in the slab
reinforcement details from the structural drawings, was placed
at the location of around 15 cm on the concrete surface of the
upper slab (refer to Fig. 7).
In the pillar (row (8) and column (D)) on the basement, the
distance was about 9 cm from the concrete surface of the upper
slab on the first basement to the center of the upper and tensile
reinforced bar. Likewise, with respect to the rate at which bending
stress is reduced due to failure to fixate the location of tensile
reinforced bar, it is considered that around 40% of the bending
strength was maintained if comparison was made between the
case of 3 cm where reinforced bar was supposed to be placed
originally and the case of 15 cm that was found in the collapsed
building.
3.6. Concrete construction
3.6.1. Separate pouring of concrete for drop panel and slab
Drop panel of slab transfers force, which is applied to slab, to
pillar and is also the part which the transferred stress concentrates
on. The drop panel handles punching shear that is considered to be
the most critical to flat slab structure. Without pouring concrete for
the drop panel and the slab together, concrete would not be able to
properly handle shear force that concentrates on pillar. Therefore,
slab should be constructed along with drop panel as a whole. If it is
inevitable to place concrete in contact with hardened concrete, it is
required to take a separate measure for reinforcement.
The examination was performed for the drop panel in row (8)
and column (B) on the second basement floor and the broken
concrete surface of slab. According to the examination results, the
boundary part between the drop panel and the slab on the drop
panel was found to be separated smoothly and horizontally as if it
was cut by a knife, showing a trace of laitance without prominence
Fig. 8. Wrong construction method of construction joint.
and depression caused by gravel falling off or being crushed.
Therefore, it was investigated that the order of pouring concrete
was to pour concrete for the drop panel (15 cm) and then, to pour
concrete for the slab (30 cm) on the drop panel after a considerable
time passed (refer to Fig. 8).
3.6.2. Omission of drop panel construction
It was extremely difficult to confirm whether or not the drop
panel, attached to the collapsed slab, was constructed and to check
the thickness of the drop panel because it was not easy to check the
location of pillar on the accident site and to measure the thickness
of the pillar precisely. Fortunately, the slab in the northern part of
the core remained to the last after the collapse, which enabled
checking the slab.
According to the results of examining the slab that stood
diagonally after being fallen to somewhere between the northern
part of the cores, it was confirmed that there existed a waterproof
layer that was used for the roof floor on the upper slab, a part of the
parapet on the upper slab remained without being destructed, and
such remained part was measured to be around 10.3 cm in length,
which was found out to be the core slab of the roof floor between
#1 and #2. Examination of the structural drawings demonstrated
that the drop panel was designed to be installed on the upper part
of the pillar on the 5th floor that was located in the part of row (4)
and column (E). With prosecutors and employees of builder
(Woosung Co. Ltd.) present, we checked the location and thickness
of the slab that was constructed on the part mentioned above
before taking a sample by coring. According to the examination
results, the thickness was confirmed to be around 30 cm, which
demonstrated that the drop panel in 15 cm out of the design
thickness in 45 cm was not constructed (refer to Fig. 9). In flat slab
structure, drop panel is a member that plays a role as a beam in
frame slab structure that consists of pillar and beam. And it is an
extremely important structural element to withstand load.
Consequently, no construction of drop panel could be a direct
factor to collapse of building. This demonstrates that it is required
for a structural expert to conduct inspection on the construction
site in the process of frame construction.
3.7. Reducing of strength
As in the case with the collapsed Sampoong Department Store,
flat slab has no beam so that load on the slab is transferred directly
to pillar, which applies a very high shear force to the surroundings
of pillar. For this reason, flat slab (drop panel) is placed to
effectively resist such shear force as shown in Fig. 9. This transfers
the load of the slab in use to the flat slab and then, to the pillar,
which is the way to resist gravity load. However, as mentioned
above, some pillars (C1A, C1B) were randomly reduced in size to be
manufactured while a certain pillar (E4) did not have the drop
panel to be installed. Furthermore, the reinforced bar of the upper
slab was supposed to bear tension force. But as reinforced bar
 T.W. Park / Forensic Science International 217 (2012) 119–126 125

Fig. 9. Missing construction of drop panel.

shear force. This can be reviewed as shown in Table 4 based on

resistance reduction factors. There must have been reduction in
effective depth of reinforced bar placed in the upper part of the
drop panel and subsequent reduction in compression strut, both of
which resulted in stress reduction by 50% respectively.

3.8. Collapse mechanism

The collapse factors mentioned thus far had been realized

continuously in the long period of 5 years. As the safety factor had
not been secured as a whole, slabs on the 5th floor and the roof
floor in the vicinity of the 5-E pillar and the 5-F pillar experienced
shear failure eventually along the circumference of the pillars. This
is believed to lead to destruction of adjacent slabs, which is a
progressive collapse, ending up with the destruction of the entire
building as shown in Fig. 11.

Fig. 10. Reduction of strength for drop panel.

sagged downward more than the standard, there was the case
where the effective depth of reinforced bar was not secured.
Consequently, it was found that reinforced bar completely failed to
resist gravity load because of reduction in members for resistance
in the process that the working load on the slab was transferred to
the pillar.
As shown in Fig. 10, if the construction were performed as
designed, a grey pillar and a drop panel would have been installed.
In reality, as the thickness of pillar decreased, only the white part
had to resist an external force. Particularly, in case of the pillar E4,
only the black part was constructed to withstand an external force,
which dramatically decreased the drop panel’s capacity of bearing

Table 4
Ratio of strength reducing factor.
P
Causes of accident (1  Ai/A)%

Original shear area (A, grey) 100

Reduction of column size (A1, white) 83.3
Mislocation of top bar (A2, white) 69.3
Missing or improper concrete casting of drop panel (A3) 33.3
Fig. 11. Start point of progressive collapse.
126 T.W. Park / Forensic Science International 217 (2012) 119–126
4. Conclusions
The building construction for the Sampoong Department Store
began in July 1987. The department store was opened after it
obtained the pre-approval for use on December 1, 1989. Since then,
the department store had been in business for 5 years. With respect
to structural system, the department store buildings had the flat
slab structure that flat slab on the floor supports pillars directly
without beam, unlike the common skeletal structure (reinforced
concrete frame) that consisted of beam and pillar. The capacity for
one pillar to bear load is equal in both of the X and Y directions. This
means that destruction of one pillar support that goes wrong may
lead to collapse of the entire structure, which is the structure that
entails a progressive collapse.
After the collapse of the building, inspectors examined the
remnants and the drawings of the building thoroughly. Based on
the examination results, they found out the direct and indirect
factors that had impact on the collapse of the building in terms of
design, construction and maintenance of the building. As a result,
the cause of the collapse can be summarized as follows.
(1) The factor that had the most critical impact on the collapse was
the changes in design and use that were made without
approval in the process of building maintenance. A very heavy
load was added, and the structure was cut and damaged
randomly, which did a great damage to the structural member.
This resulted in a severe stress reduction structurally.
(2) In the process of construction, there had been the poor
management and supervision on the construction site, which
caused the poor construction. This was the factor that had
impact on the collapse.
(3) The inadequateness in building and structural planning was
the factor that caused the progressive collapse.
(4) The collapse factors mentioned thus far had been realized
continuously in the long period of 5 years. As the safety factor
had not been secured as a whole, slabs on the 5th floor and the
roof floor in the vicinity of the 5-E pillar and the 5-F pillar
experienced shear failure eventually along the circumference
of the pillars. This is believed to lead to destruction of adjacent
slabs, which is a progressive collapse, ending up with the
destruction of the entire building.
Acknowledgement
The Author gratefully acknowledge Professor Lan Chung for
advising this research. Also this research was supported by a grant
(Code#09 R&D A01) from cutting-edge Urban Development
Program funded by Ministry of Land, Transport and Maritime
Affairs of Korean Government.
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