Police and emergency services evacuated some 300 people in the 38-storey Opal Tower in the Sydney Olympic Park and other nearby buildings on Christmas Eve |
Residents in a recently completed Sydney high-rise apartment block that made "cracking noises" on Christmas Eve were moved out again Thursday as engineers work "round the clock" to fix the issue.
Police and
emergency services evacuated some 300 people in the 38-storey Opal Tower in the
Sydney Olympic Park and other nearby buildings on Monday after reports of
"cracking noises".
The
building moved "one to two millimetres" during the incident and
authorities said they found a crack on the 10th floor.
Some
two-thirds of the units were declared safe to return to Tuesday morning, but 51
others were declared "structurally unsafe".
The issue
threw the Christmas plans of affected residents into disarray, with some
telling local media they had to sleep in their cars while waiting to return
home.
Others said
that even though their apartments were deemed to be safe, they were too afraid
to live in them.
Builder
Icon on Thursday defended the tower as "structurally sound".
"The
temporary relocation is a precautionary measure to allow engineers to work
around the clock to comprehensively investigate and remediate the site in the
quickest time frame possible, without further disruption to residents," it
added in a statement.
Icon added
that residents would be provided with accommodation and compensation, and
investigators from global engineering firm WSP and its majority owner Japanese
construction company Kajima would lead the investigation.
Residents
were told at a meeting on Thursday it could be up to 10 days before they would
be allowed back in the tower, The Sydney Morning Herald reported.
The New
South Wales state government is already conducting an investigation into the
building's structural integrity.
The
392-unit tower opened this year and is near the site of the 2000 Sydney
Olympics.
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