At 22:43 on May 24, 2001, a large portion of the third floor of the Versailles Wedding Hall collapsed in Talpiot, Jerusalem, Israel. Twenty-three people fell to their deaths through two stories, while another 380 were injured to varying degrees.
The disaster is among the deadliest civil disasters in Israeli history, with only the 2010 Mount Carmel forest fire and the 2021 Meron crowd crush having a higher number of deaths.
In the aftermath of the disaster, the Israeli parliament passed the "Versailles Law" establishing a special committee responsible for treating the people injured in the disaster and an investigative committee was established by the then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon under the leadership of the former judge Vardimos Zeiler, which probed both the Versailles disaster and the Maccabiah bridge collapse which had occurred several years earlier.
Eli Ron, who invented the Pal-Kal construction method, and three engineers involved in the construction of the hall were found guilty along with the three owners of the hall of causing death by negligence and sabotage by negligence.
Background
The Versailles Wedding Hall was built in 1986 in Talpiot in southeastern Jerusalem by engineer Eli Ron, who invented the Pal-Kal method. The floors were built with metal plates and thin layers of cement. The floor had started to visibly sag and as a result, the owners installed partitions on the floors below to stabilize and correct the sagging floors. Shortly thereafter, the owners, thinking that the issue was cosmetic, decided to remove these partitions.
A bridge collapse during the 1997 Maccabiah Games had killed four Australian participants. Investigations found that poor construction methods were at fault for the collapse and the engineers responsible for the construction of the bridge were found guilty of death by negligence.
Collapse
On May 24, 2001, the third floor of the wedding hall was being used to host the wedding of Keren and Asaf Dror. Shortly before the collapse, hundreds of wedding guests were on the dance floor (with a cover by Sarit Hadad of the song “Lev Zahav” playing) when wedding guests noticed the floor sagging several inches seconds before the fall. The third floor then gave way sending hundreds of guests plummeting two stories below.
Casualties
23 people fell to their deaths and 380 people were injured to varying degrees including bride Keren Dror, who suffered serious pelvic injuries which required multiple surgeries. Asaf Dror, the groom, escaped serious injury.
Rescue efforts
Rescue efforts were carried out by the Home Front Command's Search & Rescue Unit and the Yachtza reserve unit. Rescue efforts commenced immediately after the collapse and continued until 4pm on Saturday May 26, 2001. Three people were pulled from the rubble alive, and 23 bodies were removed.
Documentation
The disaster was captured by cameraman David Amromin who was recording the wedding via camcorder. The footage which captured the collapse and subsequent mayhem was broadcast around the world on TV networks.
Investigation
An investigation of the event concluded that it was not caused by a terrorist attack (the disaster occurred during the Second Intifada). This was based on the testimony provided by many of the wedding guests present in the building during the disaster. Witnesses reported seeing a dangerous sag in the floor moments before the collapse. An initial inquiry blamed the collapse on the Pal-Kal method of constructing light-weight coffered concrete floor systems which was banned shortly after the completion of the wedding hall since it was known and proven to be unsafe. Further review pointed to a combination of two alternative causes.
Initially, the side of the building that failed was designed to be a two-story structure, while the other side was designed to be three stories. Late in the construction process, it was decided that both sides of the building should be equal heights, and a third story was added to the shorter side. However, the live load due to occupancy is typically much greater than the design load for a roof. As a result, the structure supporting the new third story was subjected to much greater loading than was originally anticipated. The effect of this error was somewhat mitigated by the construction of partitions on the floor below, which helped redistribute the excess load such that no damage was incurred.