The Collapse of Minard Hall at NDSU.
Recent construction-related excavation work on Minard Hall caused the North face of the building to collapse, exposing faculty offices and engineering incompetence in one fell swoop.
Minard Hall (formerly Science Hall) has a concrete foundation which rests on a bed of smectite clay. This clay, the main ingredient in clumping kitty litter, is the “bedrock” of Fargo, North Dakota and much of the Red River Valley. You might think of Fargo as a bit of frozen cat crap shifting around an enormous bed of saturated litter. To prevent catastrophic collapse, heavy buildings in the area are usually placed on 150 foot caissons (stilts), which rest on bedrock. Because Minard rests on the clay alone, removing the surrounding dirt probably caused the clay to ooze from underneath the building. More about smectite clays from Dr. Donald Schwert, who has precisely nothing to do with this post.
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Unfortunately, this building houses my department, experiment, and student office.
In this image, the third window from the bottom right is my office.
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This collapse represents a major setback for the institution as a whole, not to mention my progress as a graduate student. Tough times.
dan, i’m so sorry. i thought of you and your research right away… hang in there. ps, turf saturday if you wanna mourn with us.
Oh no! I hope you’re able to recover all your stuff.
Dan-
Benner lookied at these with me and he was so sad for you. “poor Dan, I am so sad for him”
He is making you a book skanner feks-it manual as we speak to cheer you up.
Would pie help?
Thanks all. At this point in time, I just have to wait and see what happens. I am making backup plans for my experiment and other work.
today i man pointed at the paper at told me about how he took amphetamines (when they were still legal)to stay up all night and study for an exam. the there was a fire or something in he building and the exam was held later in the day and he could barely remember his name and bombed it. it had nothing to do with the collapse but now when i think of it i think of meth and bad teeth.