The Algo Centre Mall Collapse | Historical Disaster Documentary | Fascinating Horror
"On the 23rd of June, 2012, in the city of Elliot Lake in Ontario, Canada, a segment of the rooftop parking deck at the Algo Centre Mall collapsed..."
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LearningTranscript
00:00On the 23rd of June, 2012, in the city of Elliot Lake in Ontario, Canada, a segment of the rooftop
00:19parking deck at the Algo Centre Mall collapsed, smashing down through two floors of the shopping
00:26centre. The incident, which claimed the lives of two people and injured 22 more, lasted just a few
00:34short moments but was the result of a slow, quiet, corrosive process that had been going on for
00:41decades. The Algo Centre Mall was opened in August 1980. As the largest commercial complex in the
00:51area the mall acted as a community centre and regularly hosted events such as car shows,
00:57fundraisers for charities, antique appraisals and local markets. The mall was a sizable 18,000
01:05square meters, or 190,000 square feet, and on top of a plethora of stores and services also contained
01:14the 80-room Algo Inn, the largest hotel and retirement residence in the area,
01:19a library, constituency offices, public health offices and a grocery store. The building also
01:27happened to have rooftop parking. Despite how important the mall was to the community, the
01:33building was plagued with issues from the beginning. From the 1990s leaks were a pretty regular
01:40occurrence. It was commonplace to see the floors of the mall littered with buckets, while the
01:46ceilings were covered in a patchwork of visible repairs. In 2008 the Bank of Nova Scotia branch
01:54in the mall had to close down for a week to repair the damage caused by multiple leaks.
02:02While obviously inconvenient, these leaks were only a prelude to the much greater disaster still
02:08to come. At approximately 2.20pm on the 23rd of June 2012 a large section of the Algo Centre
02:16Mall's rooftop, which also doubled as its parking deck, collapsed, bringing thousands of pounds of
02:23concrete and metal crashing down onto the floors below. Shoppers and staff, caught entirely
02:29unawares, fled as best they could, evacuating even the unaffected areas of the mall, as the whole
02:36building was now, quite reasonably, believed to be structurally unstable. 22 people who escaped
02:44the mall did so with injuries requiring treatment. Two further people inside the building at the time
02:50of the collapse, however, were not so lucky. 37-year-old Lucy Aylwin and 74-year-old Dolores
02:58Perizzolo were trapped in the rubble at the site of the collapse. Aylwin had been working at a
03:04lottery kiosk at the mall, and Perizzolo had been her customer. Now the two were trapped together
03:12under the dangerously unstable wreckage. A search-and-rescue team was on site within
03:19hours of the collapse, but faced an incredibly complicated task. The building was at risk of
03:26further structural failure, a situation only worsened by persistent rainfall that day.
03:32Despite these conditions rescuers worked their way through the debris
03:36until they were close enough to the two trapped women to hear signs of life.
03:42Before they could effect a rescue, though, a damaged escalator began to fall and they were forced to
03:47retreat. By the early hours of the 25th of June the two women had been trapped for more than a day.
03:56Their family and friends had traveled to the site to keep a vigil, and rescuers rallied and brought
04:01in more equipment to try and save them. A robotic arm was delivered to the site, something which took
04:08another full day, and was used to safely clear the debris trapping the women. By this time, however,
04:15it was too late. Both had passed away. Although there were signs that Lucy Aylwin might have
04:22survived for quite some time, and might have been saved, had the rescue operation been just a little
04:28bit swifter? An investigation revealed that the decision to make the roof of the mall into a
04:35parking area had played a huge role in the incident. Each day during the winter of many successive
04:43years cars had been moving from the streets of Elliot Lake onto the roof of the mall, bringing
04:48with them salt and road grit. This salt had sunk into the structure of the building, corroding the
04:55metal supports which held the roof in place. To prevent this from happening a waterproof membrane
05:02should have been installed to protect the supports from corrosion. No such membrane was actually
05:08legally required by the building codes of the late 1970s and early 1980s, and so nobody was
05:14overly concerned when plans to fit one fell through. Instead a contractor simply patched
05:21up existing damage with sealant, a step which did nothing to fix the underlying problem of seeping
05:27saltwater corroding supports. Poorly maintained rooftop parking may not have been the only
05:34structural issue faced by the mall. Structural engineer John Cadleck, who was involved in the
05:40building of the Algo Centre Mall, claimed the project was marred by shoddy workmanship from
05:46the beginning, with missing bolts, crooked columns, and rusted steel beams all being noted as problems
05:53faced during construction. Cadleck was also confused by what he called the
05:59unique decision to put the parking lot on the roof. Despite his reservations, however, Cadleck signed
06:07off on the project, stating that at the time he believed the deficiencies had been rectified.
06:13This was ultimately not the case. The aftermath of the Algo Centre Mall collapse was extensive
06:22and multifaceted. Unsurprisingly a class action lawsuit was filed against the mall's current and
06:29former owners and construction and engineering professionals involved in the building of the
06:34structure... a lawsuit which, as of May 2020, was still ongoing. An engineer named Robert G. H. Wood,
06:43who signed off on a report declaring the mall as structurally sound mere weeks before the collapse,
06:49was indicted on two counts of criminal negligence causing death and one count of criminal negligence
06:55causing bodily harm. Ultimately the judge decided that there wasn't enough evidence to find Wood
07:02guilty, although he did say that Wood should accept moral responsibility for the incident,
07:08stating that his work was shoddy, sloppy, and even inadequate... even if it didn't reach the levels
07:16of being criminal. The rest of the mall was demolished following the partial roof collapse.
07:24The closure of the mall struck a huge blow to the local economy. The mall had been a central part
07:30of the Elliott Lake economy, employing hundreds of locals and housing numerous community services
07:36such as public health offices and the library. Ongoing structural problems notwithstanding,
07:43for many in the Elliott Lake community the mall had been their main social outlet, and its loss
07:49was keenly felt. Many people and businesses left Elliott Lake following the collapse. A new mall
07:56named Pearson Plaza was opened in 2016, representing for many a potential fresh start
08:03for the community. Nowadays, however, Elliott Lake is perhaps most well known as a popular
08:10retirement community. In addition to the local impact, the disaster drew attention to the
08:16government's plans to cut federal funding for emergency services, including the search and
08:21rescue team involved in the agonizingly slow rescue attempt. In 2012 their budget had already
08:29been cut by $1 million, as compared to the previous year. Thankfully the collapse of the Algo Centre
08:36Mall helped to turn the tide on this trend. Following the report made by the Elliott Lake
08:42Inquiry, the Ontario government allotted an additional $2.5 million into emergency response
08:48measures. This provided funding for specialized rescue situations such as building collapses and
08:55chemical attacks and contaminations. While these incidents are incredibly rare they do still happen,
09:02and the equipment and resources that rescue personnel have on hand when they do
09:07can become not just a budget item but life or death for innocent people.
09:13This video was made in collaboration with Brick Immorta. Brick is something of an expert when it
09:20comes to malls. On his channel he explores dead malls and tells the stories behind them, and also
09:27covers a few civil engineering failures here and there. He's put together his own take on this
09:32disaster, and we've launched our videos simultaneously. I touch on how important the
09:38mall was to the community in this video, but with his insight Brick really gives you a feel for what
09:43the mall was like, and puts it in context in a way that I never could. Every disaster is a
09:49complicated story, and this one is no exception. If you want to go deeper on this particular story
09:56go watch his video where you can learn more about the delay in the rescue operation,
10:01the impact on the local community, and how malls in Canada
10:07might be a little different from malls in your country.
10:31you