Maccabiah bridge collapse
Encyclopedia
The Maccabiah bridge collapse was the catastrophic failure of a pedestrian bridge over the Yarkon River in Tel Aviv
, Israel
on July 14, 1997. The collapse of the temporary wooden structure killed four and injured 60 Australia
n athletes who were visiting Israel to participate in the Maccabiah Games
. One of the four athletes died during the collapse, but the other three were killed afterwards by infections caused by exposure to the polluted river water.
Five people, including the engineer who designed the bridge and the chairman of the Tel Aviv Games Organising Committee, were later convicted of recklessly causing death and injury. The incident and subsequent inquiries were extensively reported on by the Australian media. The tragedy
highlighted Israel's neglect of environmental issues, especially with regard to its rivers and waterways.
are open to all Israeli citizens and non-Israeli Jews from around the world.
The 15th Maccabiah Games
, held in 1997 and billed as the third largest sporting event in the world, included 5,300 participants from 56 nations competing in 38 athletic events. The opening ceremony on July 14 at 8 p.m. (local time), held at Ramat Gan Stadium and designed to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the First Zionist Congress
, was attended by 50,000 people and featured hundreds of dancers, dazzling sound and light displays, and was shown live on Israeli television. As at past games, a temporary footbridge, 60 feet long and 18 feet wide, was constructed across the nearby Yarkon River to allow competitors to march into the stadium during the ceremony from an assembly area on the other side of the river.
n team, consisted of the 373 members of the Australian delegation. As the Australian athletes, packed together in parallel rows of six, crossed the river the bridge's support beams at roughly mid-span suddenly snapped, plunging around 100 of the Australians eight meters into the river below. Several of the fallen were forcibly submerged in the 1.6 meter deep river by the press of falling athletes above them.
Other athletes, bystanders, event staff, and policemen leapt into the river to rescue the fallen. Inside the stadium, Israeli government officials, including President
Ezer Weizman
, chose to continue with the opening ceremony, but canceled the remainder of the march of the national teams into the stadium. Israeli television maintained live coverage, switching back and forth between the frantic rescue efforts outside the stadium and the festive dancing and light shows inside.
The 67 injured were taken to nearby Beilinson Hospital
in Petah Tikva
and Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center. One victim, Gregory Small, 37, a bowler
from Sydney
, was dead on arrival, apparently as a result of injuries suffered during the fall. The remaining 66 victims did not appear to have suffered life-threatening injuries. Their injuries included broken bones and water inhalation.
Within an hour or two of admission to the hospital, a number of victims began to show signs of asphyxia
. Doctors discovered that an unidentified organism was attacking their respiratory system
s and pulmonary
blood vessels. By the next morning, seven athletes were in critical condition.
Patrick Surkin, who ran the intensive care unit
at Tel Aviv Medical Center, wondered whether a toxin might be the culprit behind the infections. He contacted David Pargament, chief of the Yarkon River Authority. Pargament explained that 36 hours before the collapse, mosquito larvicide oil, a mixture of jet fuel
and oil, had been sprayed on the surface of the Yarkon to suppress mosquitoes. Subsequent lab tests, however, found no traces of the substance in the sick athletes.
Bowler Yetty Bennett, 50, died later that day from asphyxia. Elizabeth Sawicki, 47, a member of the delegation's bridge
team, died July 26 from complications from infection. Bowler Warren Zines, 54, died on August 10, 1997 of severe respiratory-tract infection at Sheba Medical Center
. Zines was the fourth and final fatality from the accident.
An autopsy of Zines finally identified the source of the infections as Pseudallescheria boydii fungus. The fungus, usually fatal when infecting humans, colonizes in the lungs, causing pneumonia and killing cells. The microbes that it spawns often spread infection to the brain, kidneys, heart, and thyroid.
After Zines' death, one athlete, Sasha Elterman, 15, remained in critical condition. Elterman, a tennis player, underwent 18 surgeries in the six months after the collapse, 13 of them brain surgeries. Elterman ultimately survived her ordeal, but her lungs permanently lost 40% of their capacity and she suffered from periodic convulsions.
, immediately convened a public commission, chaired by Yishai Dotan, to investigate the collapse. Israeli police also conducted their own investigation. The Dotan Commission released its findings on July 23, 1997. The commission found that the Maccabiah Games' organizing committee, led by Yoram Eyal, had departed from the usual practice of paying the Israeli army to construct the bridge. Instead, in an apparent effort to reduce costs, Eyal contracted with a company called Irgunit, headed by Adam Mishori, to construct the bridge. Irgunit's traditional business was the construction of props and stage sets
for theater productions
. The company had never designed nor built a bridge
.
Irgunit sub-contracted the bridge's construction to Baruch Karagula and Yehoshua Ben-Ezra (also known as "Ben-Ezra Construction"). The commission found that Karagula and Ezra were not licensed to build bridges, had never attempted to build a bridge, and used substandard materials in the bridge's construction. Photographs taken after the collapse showed that the bridge was constructed out of rusty metal pipes bound together with wire.
The commission concluded that the bridge's engineer, Micha Bar-Ilan, did not submit a blueprint for the bridge, designed a bridge that was inadequate for its intended use, and did not properly supervise or coordinate the bridge's construction. The commission faulted the Maccabiah Games' organizers for poor coordination and oversight over the bridge's assembly.
An investigation by Augustine Zycher for the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council
reported that the Israeli army had employed Tamir Rowner, an experienced bridge construction engineer, to build previous bridges for the games. For the 1997 games, Maccabiah officials, apparently unwilling to pay the army's price of $111,000, accepted a bid from Irgunit to build the bridge for $34,750.
According to Zycher, Mishori kept $7,700 of the payment and gave the rest to Karagula and Ben-Ezra to erect the bridge. Karagula and Ben-Ezra hired Bar-Ilan to design and oversee the bridge's construction. Bar-Ilan claimed that his bridge as designed would support 250 kg per square meter, which did not meet Israeli government standards which required a pedestrian bridge to support 500 kg per square meter. In any event, the Dotan investigation found that the bridge was far weaker than what Bar-Ilan claimed. Furthermore, a municipal permit was required to construct the bridge, which Karagula and Ben-Ezra did not obtain. The municipality in which the bridge was constructed was Ramat Gan. Zvi Bar, Ramat Gan's mayor and head of the city planning division which issued construction permits, was a member of the Maccabiah committee which helped select Irgunit. Bar apparently did not ensure that Irgunit, Karagula, or Ben-Ezra obtained the necessary permit and made no effort to ensure that the bridge as constructed was safe.
brought criminal charges against Eyal, Mishori, Karagula, Ben-Ezra, and Bar-Ilan for causing death by negligence
and for building without proper permits. On March 15, 1998 in Tel Aviv Magistrate Court all five pleaded not guilty. Final arguments in the trial were presented in October 1999.
On April 17, 2000 the three judge panel of the court found all five defendants guilty of causing death by negligence. The defendants were sentenced on June 5, 2000. Bar-Ilan was sentenced to one year and nine months in prison, plus a suspended sentence of 21 months. Ben-Ezra and Kargula were given 15-months in prison, plus suspended sentences of two years. Mishori received nine months in prison, plus a suspended sentence of 15-months. Eyal was sentenced to six months of community service.
Tel Aviv
Tel Aviv , officially Tel Aviv-Yafo , is the second most populous city in Israel, with a population of 404,400 on a land area of . The city is located on the Israeli Mediterranean coastline in west-central Israel. It is the largest and most populous city in the metropolitan area of Gush Dan, with...
, Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
on July 14, 1997. The collapse of the temporary wooden structure killed four and injured 60 Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
n athletes who were visiting Israel to participate in the Maccabiah Games
Maccabiah Games
The Maccabiah is an international Jewish athletic event similar to the Olympics held in Israel every four years under the auspices of the Maccabi Federation, affiliated with the Maccabi World Union. The Maccabiah Games is the third largest international sports competition in the world...
. One of the four athletes died during the collapse, but the other three were killed afterwards by infections caused by exposure to the polluted river water.
Five people, including the engineer who designed the bridge and the chairman of the Tel Aviv Games Organising Committee, were later convicted of recklessly causing death and injury. The incident and subsequent inquiries were extensively reported on by the Australian media. The tragedy
Tragedy (event)
A tragedy is an event in which one or more losses, usually of human life, occurs that is viewed as mournful. Such an event is said to be tragic....
highlighted Israel's neglect of environmental issues, especially with regard to its rivers and waterways.
Background
The Maccabiah Games, first staged in 1932, is an athletic event held every four years in Tel Aviv, Israel, to celebrate the Zionist Revolution, and to demonstrate the unity and athleticism of the Jewish people. The games include competitions for adults and for junior athletes aged 15 to 18, andare open to all Israeli citizens and non-Israeli Jews from around the world.
The 15th Maccabiah Games
1997 Maccabiah Games
The 1997 Maccabiah Games are remembered for being marred by a bridge collapse that killed several participants.The 15th Maccabiah had more than 5,000 athletes from 53 countries competing in 36 sports....
, held in 1997 and billed as the third largest sporting event in the world, included 5,300 participants from 56 nations competing in 38 athletic events. The opening ceremony on July 14 at 8 p.m. (local time), held at Ramat Gan Stadium and designed to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the First Zionist Congress
First Zionist Congress
The First Zionist Congress was the inaugural congress of the Zionist Organization held in Basel , Switzerland, from August 29 to August 31, 1897. It was convened and chaired by Theodor Herzl, the founder of the modern Zionism movement...
, was attended by 50,000 people and featured hundreds of dancers, dazzling sound and light displays, and was shown live on Israeli television. As at past games, a temporary footbridge, 60 feet long and 18 feet wide, was constructed across the nearby Yarkon River to allow competitors to march into the stadium during the ceremony from an assembly area on the other side of the river.
Collapse
As scheduled during the opening ceremony, the participating athletes, teamed with their respective national delegations, began to march across the bridge and into the stadium. The second nation to cross the bridge, following the AustriaAustria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
n team, consisted of the 373 members of the Australian delegation. As the Australian athletes, packed together in parallel rows of six, crossed the river the bridge's support beams at roughly mid-span suddenly snapped, plunging around 100 of the Australians eight meters into the river below. Several of the fallen were forcibly submerged in the 1.6 meter deep river by the press of falling athletes above them.
Other athletes, bystanders, event staff, and policemen leapt into the river to rescue the fallen. Inside the stadium, Israeli government officials, including President
President of Israel
The President of the State of Israel is the head of state of Israel. The position is largely an apolitical ceremonial figurehead role, with the real executive power lying in the hands of the Prime Minister. The current president is Shimon Peres who took office on 15 July 2007...
Ezer Weizman
Ezer Weizman
' was the seventh President of Israel, first elected in 1993 and re-elected in 1998. Before the presidency, Weizman was commander of the Israeli Air Force and Minister of Defense.-Biography:...
, chose to continue with the opening ceremony, but canceled the remainder of the march of the national teams into the stadium. Israeli television maintained live coverage, switching back and forth between the frantic rescue efforts outside the stadium and the festive dancing and light shows inside.
The 67 injured were taken to nearby Beilinson Hospital
Rabin Medical Center
The Rabin Medical Center is a medical center in Petah Tikva, Israel. It is currently the second largest medical center in Israel after Sheba Medical Center, having lost the title of largest in 2006...
in Petah Tikva
Petah Tikva
Petah Tikva known as Em HaMoshavot , is a city in the Center District of Israel, east of Tel Aviv.According to the Central Bureau of Statistics, at the end of 2009, the city's population stood at 209,600. The population density is approximately...
and Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center. One victim, Gregory Small, 37, a bowler
Bowling
Bowling Bowling Bowling (1375–1425; late Middle English bowle, variant of boule Bowling (1375–1425; late Middle English bowle, variant of boule...
from Sydney
Sydney
Sydney is the most populous city in Australia and the state capital of New South Wales. Sydney is located on Australia's south-east coast of the Tasman Sea. As of June 2010, the greater metropolitan area had an approximate population of 4.6 million people...
, was dead on arrival, apparently as a result of injuries suffered during the fall. The remaining 66 victims did not appear to have suffered life-threatening injuries. Their injuries included broken bones and water inhalation.
Infections
Asphyxia
Asphyxia or asphyxiation is a condition of severely deficient supply of oxygen to the body that arises from being unable to breathe normally. An example of asphyxia is choking. Asphyxia causes generalized hypoxia, which primarily affects the tissues and organs...
. Doctors discovered that an unidentified organism was attacking their respiratory system
Respiratory system
The respiratory system is the anatomical system of an organism that introduces respiratory gases to the interior and performs gas exchange. In humans and other mammals, the anatomical features of the respiratory system include airways, lungs, and the respiratory muscles...
s and pulmonary
Lung
The lung is the essential respiration organ in many air-breathing animals, including most tetrapods, a few fish and a few snails. In mammals and the more complex life forms, the two lungs are located near the backbone on either side of the heart...
blood vessels. By the next morning, seven athletes were in critical condition.
Patrick Surkin, who ran the intensive care unit
Intensive Care Unit
thumb|220px|ICU roomAn intensive-care unit , critical-care unit , intensive-therapy unit/intensive-treatment unit is a specialized department in a hospital that provides intensive-care medicine...
at Tel Aviv Medical Center, wondered whether a toxin might be the culprit behind the infections. He contacted David Pargament, chief of the Yarkon River Authority. Pargament explained that 36 hours before the collapse, mosquito larvicide oil, a mixture of jet fuel
Jet fuel
Jet fuel is a type of aviation fuel designed for use in aircraft powered by gas-turbine engines. It is clear to straw-colored in appearance. The most commonly used fuels for commercial aviation are Jet A and Jet A-1 which are produced to a standardized international specification...
and oil, had been sprayed on the surface of the Yarkon to suppress mosquitoes. Subsequent lab tests, however, found no traces of the substance in the sick athletes.
Bowler Yetty Bennett, 50, died later that day from asphyxia. Elizabeth Sawicki, 47, a member of the delegation's bridge
Contract bridge
Contract bridge, usually known simply as bridge, is a trick-taking card game using a standard deck of 52 playing cards played by four players in two competing partnerships with partners sitting opposite each other around a small table...
team, died July 26 from complications from infection. Bowler Warren Zines, 54, died on August 10, 1997 of severe respiratory-tract infection at Sheba Medical Center
Sheba Medical Center
The Chaim Sheba Medical Center at Tel Hashomer , also Tel HaShomer Hospital, is the largest hospital in Israel.-Overview:The hospital was named after Chaim Sheba, the founding director. It was established in 1948 as the country's first military hospital to treat casualties of Israel's War of...
. Zines was the fourth and final fatality from the accident.
An autopsy of Zines finally identified the source of the infections as Pseudallescheria boydii fungus. The fungus, usually fatal when infecting humans, colonizes in the lungs, causing pneumonia and killing cells. The microbes that it spawns often spread infection to the brain, kidneys, heart, and thyroid.
After Zines' death, one athlete, Sasha Elterman, 15, remained in critical condition. Elterman, a tennis player, underwent 18 surgeries in the six months after the collapse, 13 of them brain surgeries. Elterman ultimately survived her ordeal, but her lungs permanently lost 40% of their capacity and she suffered from periodic convulsions.
Initial investigations
Israel's deputy minister of education, Moshe PeledMoshe Peled (politician)
Moshe Peled is an Israeli former politician who served as a member of the Knesset for Tzomet, Mekhora and Moledet between 1992 and 1999.-Biography:...
, immediately convened a public commission, chaired by Yishai Dotan, to investigate the collapse. Israeli police also conducted their own investigation. The Dotan Commission released its findings on July 23, 1997. The commission found that the Maccabiah Games' organizing committee, led by Yoram Eyal, had departed from the usual practice of paying the Israeli army to construct the bridge. Instead, in an apparent effort to reduce costs, Eyal contracted with a company called Irgunit, headed by Adam Mishori, to construct the bridge. Irgunit's traditional business was the construction of props and stage sets
Set construction
Set construction is the process by which a set designer works in collaboration with the director of a production to create the set for a theatrical, film or television production...
for theater productions
Theatrical scenery
Theatrical scenery is that which is used as a setting for a theatrical production. Scenery may be just about anything, from a single chair to an elaborately re-created street, no matter how large or how small, whether or not the item was custom-made or is, in fact, the genuine item, appropriated...
. The company had never designed nor built a bridge
Bridge
A bridge is a structure built to span physical obstacles such as a body of water, valley, or road, for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle...
.
Irgunit sub-contracted the bridge's construction to Baruch Karagula and Yehoshua Ben-Ezra (also known as "Ben-Ezra Construction"). The commission found that Karagula and Ezra were not licensed to build bridges, had never attempted to build a bridge, and used substandard materials in the bridge's construction. Photographs taken after the collapse showed that the bridge was constructed out of rusty metal pipes bound together with wire.
The commission concluded that the bridge's engineer, Micha Bar-Ilan, did not submit a blueprint for the bridge, designed a bridge that was inadequate for its intended use, and did not properly supervise or coordinate the bridge's construction. The commission faulted the Maccabiah Games' organizers for poor coordination and oversight over the bridge's assembly.
An investigation by Augustine Zycher for the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council
AIJAC
AIJAC, or the Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council, is an organisation headquartered in Melbourne, Australia. It is active in lobbying the Australian government on issues of concern to Australian Jews and in monitoring and publicising events in Israel and the Middle East.The organisation...
reported that the Israeli army had employed Tamir Rowner, an experienced bridge construction engineer, to build previous bridges for the games. For the 1997 games, Maccabiah officials, apparently unwilling to pay the army's price of $111,000, accepted a bid from Irgunit to build the bridge for $34,750.
According to Zycher, Mishori kept $7,700 of the payment and gave the rest to Karagula and Ben-Ezra to erect the bridge. Karagula and Ben-Ezra hired Bar-Ilan to design and oversee the bridge's construction. Bar-Ilan claimed that his bridge as designed would support 250 kg per square meter, which did not meet Israeli government standards which required a pedestrian bridge to support 500 kg per square meter. In any event, the Dotan investigation found that the bridge was far weaker than what Bar-Ilan claimed. Furthermore, a municipal permit was required to construct the bridge, which Karagula and Ben-Ezra did not obtain. The municipality in which the bridge was constructed was Ramat Gan. Zvi Bar, Ramat Gan's mayor and head of the city planning division which issued construction permits, was a member of the Maccabiah committee which helped select Irgunit. Bar apparently did not ensure that Irgunit, Karagula, or Ben-Ezra obtained the necessary permit and made no effort to ensure that the bridge as constructed was safe.
Criminal trial
Based on the findings of the Dotan and police investigations, Israel's attorney general Elyakim RubinsteinElyakim Rubinstein
Elyakim Rubinstein was the Attorney General of Israel from 1997 to 2004 and is currently serving as a Judge on the Supreme Court of Israel.Rubinstein, a lifelong Israeli diplomat and civil servant, has had an influential role in that country's internal and external politics, most notably in...
brought criminal charges against Eyal, Mishori, Karagula, Ben-Ezra, and Bar-Ilan for causing death by negligence
Criminal negligence
In the criminal law, criminal negligence is one of the three general classes of mens rea element required to constitute a conventional as opposed to strict liability offense. It is defined as an act that is:-Concept:...
and for building without proper permits. On March 15, 1998 in Tel Aviv Magistrate Court all five pleaded not guilty. Final arguments in the trial were presented in October 1999.
On April 17, 2000 the three judge panel of the court found all five defendants guilty of causing death by negligence. The defendants were sentenced on June 5, 2000. Bar-Ilan was sentenced to one year and nine months in prison, plus a suspended sentence of 21 months. Ben-Ezra and Kargula were given 15-months in prison, plus suspended sentences of two years. Mishori received nine months in prison, plus a suspended sentence of 15-months. Eyal was sentenced to six months of community service.