Chris Michailidi remembers smoking a cigarette, during his break while building what would be a People’s Bank location in Bridgeport, near L’Ambiance Plaza in 1987.
One minute Michailidi saw concrete being pumped out. Then he witnessed the worst construction accident in Connecticut’s history.
“The next thing I know, it's down,” Michailidi said. “I mean, it happened just that fast. One slab hits the next below, and then it just pancakes right down.”
He estimates it took less than five seconds for L’Ambiance Plaza to collapse. It was a 16 story residential project under construction.
The accident killed 28 construction workers. It led to safety reforms and an annual commemoration of the disaster at Bridgeport City Hall, now in its 38th year.
But some fear cuts by the federal government may weaken worksite protections and lead to similar tragedies.
Ed Hawthorne, president of the state’s American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO) chapter, said the federal government's efforts at downsizing its workforce will harm worker safety.
“Make no mistake about it, workers' health and safety is more at risk now than it has been in decades,” Hawthorne said. From the gutting of (National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health) NIOSH to proposals to literally eliminate (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) OSHA, the situation is dire.”
Hawthorne spoke at L’Ambiance Plaza memorial service Wednesday and said Connecticut has the third lowest worker fatality rate in the country. He attributes this largely to the work of labor unions.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal also spoke at the memorial and says the day holds special meaning as a result of federal efforts at slashing its workforce.
“What we're seeing in Washington these days is a neglect of that solemn responsibility,” Blumenthal said. “We need to redouble our efforts in the name and the honor of the 28 people we remember today.”
Michailidi, a former ironworker, retired in 2018. He said he only declined to work on two job sites in his entire career, and one of them was the L’Ambiance Plaza.
He didn’t work there, because he felt the construction technique used for the site, known as lift slab, wasn’t safe.
“Lift slab, they pour the floors on the ground, and then they jack them up to place,” he said. “Once it gets to place, then they put wedges in and weld the wedges, and that's what is holding that floor up off of the columns, so anything slips, you got problems.”
The building collapsed after a slab slipped and fell onto other slabs, causing the structure to pancake on each other, according to OSHA officials in 1987. The construction technique is now banned in Connecticut.
