Song, wind, and mayhem: The Indiana State Fair stage collapse

Abstract

The study of planning and execution failures resulting in disastrous outcomes for public events often offers much value when preparing for similar future events. While not recent, the lessons learned from the Indiana State Fair stage collapse of 2011 remain especially pertinent, due to thorough technical and managerial forensic investigations and their rigorous examination during subsequent litigation about the fatal event. Continued concern about life safety and inconsistent building code enforcement and design guidance for publicly occupied temporary structures, eg, outdoor stages, recently drew recommended changes by the International Code Council for the 2024 edition of the International Building Code. Codification of technical lessons learned is seldom immediate. Even with checklists and written plans of action, the full context of managerial lessons learned can be forgotten, as people without first-hand experience of earlier disasters plan later events. Salient events of the past can reinforce valuable lessons for today’s practitioners, even to produce building code changes. That is certainly so for the Indiana State Fair stage collapse of August 2011.