A rooftop parking lot collapse in East Vancouver that killed one man, trapped eight others and destroyed at least one ground-floor business was allegedly caused by a massive pile of dirt, according to court documents.
The roof gave way in July of 2022 and the body of one employee who had been working below was recovered after a painstaking, 28-hour search carried out by dozens of first responders.
"A Bobcat was doing some work on the section of the parkade roof that gave way," Vancouver Fire and Rescue Services Asst. Chief Dan Moberg told CTV News at the time. "A section of the rooftop parking lot then collapsed onto an office space."
Last week, the owner of an auto repair shop in the building filed a lawsuit in B.C. Supreme Court claiming the building owners, a roofing company and the operator of a bobcat were negligent and failed to ensure that the work being done on the roof on that day would not lead to the collapse.
None of the claims have been tested in court and none of the defendants have filed a response.
The plaintiff, Bimmer Haus Enterprises Inc., says that the work underway on the day of the collapse involved a Bobcat removing dirt and soil from the roof. The Bobcat operator, referred to as John Doe, is alleged to have "removed almost 200 tons of dirt and soil from the roof and piled it up on one side of the roof of the property," the notice of civil claim says.
"The weight of the soil and dirt on the roof caused the roof to collapse, which resulted in the plaintiff's assets at its place of business being damaged or destroyed," it continues.
When the roof collapsed, the claim says, multiple vehicles in the shop were damaged or destroyed. In addition, the business was shut down, which caused a loss of profit and a "loss of goodwill," according to the documents.
The allegations against the building owner, Gizella Pastry ULC Inc., are that proper engineering studies weren't done before the work was started to ensure the roof could bear the weight of the dirt and soil. In addition, the owners are alleged to have failed to hire a "competent contractor," to have failed to provide adequate supervision of the work, and to have failed to properly plan for how and where the dirt should be piled.
The allegations against the roofing contractor, CentiMark Ltd., are similar.
"It failed to create a proper plan as to how the dumping of the soil and dirt from the roof should be carried out so as not to cause the roof to collapse," the court documents say, adding the company "failed to determine how much weight the roof could support without collapsing."
A failure to supervise the Bobcat operator is also alleged in the claim, particularly, a failure to "direct John Doe to spread out all the dirt and soil that he was moving in more than one place so as to distribute the weight of the dirt and soil in several places rather than dumping it all in one place."
John Doe, the claim alleges, was negligent in his failure to ensure that his work did not cause the roof to collapse.
Bimmer Haus Enterprises Inc. is seeking an unspecified amount of damages.
