There will be more disasters in the future similar to the building collapse in Wellawatte, if proper precautionary measures are not taken, industry experts warned.
“Unqualified personnel are supervising the construct of high rise buildings which is a very dangerous thing.
The collapsed building in Wellawatte was constructed by a small-time building contractor who had no knowledge of such matters.
We need to prevent such situations in future and the only way is to monitor and regulate the activities,” the Institution of Engineering Sri Lanka (IESL) President Eng. Jayavilal Meegoda said.
The people will lose confidence in high-rise buildings if this type of incident is repeated.
As the country has many high-rise structures coming up, incidents of this nature will be a big blow to the construction industry, he said.
“When you deploy people without qualifications these will be the repercussions. There will be many more failures to follow unless remedial measures are taken immediately,” he said.
Stressing that the most important factor of the chartered engineer is the qualification, Meegoda said that this kind of disastrous situation could have easily prevented if proper mechanism to monitor and supervise was in place.