COLLAPSE OF TEXAS TOWER NO. 4 19 



Senator Jackson. All right. That is fair enough. Has the Air 

 Force ever been advised, or have you received advice from those who 

 are in a position to know, from a professional standpoint, whether 

 or not this tower was properly designed ? 



Mr. Chartk. I have personally seen no indication that would sug- 

 gest otherwise. 



Senator jACKSOisr. So that, in other words, if you were out to do 

 this again, you would not have a better design than the one you had^ 

 and therefore, no matter what you did, it would collapse. That i& 

 apparently 



Mr. Charyk. No ; I would think that the architect-engineer might 

 in fact make certain design modifications if he were to do the job 

 again. 



Senator Jackson. Surely there must be — I do not want to be un- 

 fair, but is it not quite clear now that there was a design failure in 

 this thing, then construction followed, and collapse — surely it could 

 have been designed differently and would have stood up. Now, if I 

 am wrong, then I want to 



ADEQUACY Or DESIGN" CRITERIA 



Mr. Charts. From a personal point of view, I would have some 

 concern as to the adequacy of the original design. But as I say, 

 there are some difficult factors involved here so that in order to have- 

 a firm position one would have to undertake a complete analysis of 

 the situation, which of course I have not done. 



Senator Jackson. Well, we will go into the question later whether 

 prudence was exercised at the time the decision was made to go ahead 

 with this design. That is the Navy's responsibility, and I will direct 

 my questions in more detail, Mr. Chairman, at that time. 



Senator Stennis. All right. Senator. 



Mr. Charyk. I would like to just reiterate one other point. Senator, 

 namely. Hurricane Donna which was, I believe, largely instru- 

 mental in the final failure did exceed the original design criteria. 



Senator Jackson. But it was in trouble prior to Donna. 



Mr. Charyk. There were difficulties experienced prior to that. 



Senator Jackson. And from what I read from your statement, it 

 is clear to me that this tower could have collapsed with something 

 short of Donna. 



Senator Stennis. Just 1 minute, if you can, Senator. Are you. 

 through ? 



Senator Jackson. Yes, I am through. 



Senator Stennis. Following up Senator Jackson's questions, Mr. 

 Secretary, this is the way it looks here to a layman. You have this 

 tower designed to withstand certain forces of winds and waves. 

 Now, did the wind ever equal or exceed the design criteria ? 



Mr. Charyk. I think in the case of Hurricane Donna, they exceeded 

 the design criteria. 



Senator Stennis. All right. Up to Hurricane Donna the velocity 

 of the wind had not reached the design criteria. Still you had all this 

 trouble. The waves had not exceeded the design maximum, up until 

 then, had they? 



Mr. CtHARTK. I believe that is correct. 



