A vertical crack has formed between two walls in the Woodland Elementary School library, where the soil has settled and part of the building has dropped.
Brick walls are bulging and cracking, and concrete slabs are shifting and sinking.
During one weekend in August, a vertical crack as wide as about two inches opened between two walls in the library. Entire walls had shifted and the building had dropped after soil underneath it settled, said Allen Thacker, Oak Ridge Schools supervisor of maintenance and operations.
A structural engineer was called immediately, and already-planned repairs at Woodland Elementary School have now become a high priority.
“It was substantial shifting,” Thacker said.
Merit Construction of Knoxville has been selected to make $1 million worth of repairs in a two-month project at Woodland this summer. A pier will be put underneath the library, and the building will be lifted back up, with supports installed every six to eight feet.
About one-third of the library, or roughly 900 square feet, is now walled off from students and staff.
Metal flashing has been installed over an entrance at Woodland Elementary School to keep bricks from falling.
Outside, bricks have fallen from exterior walls, including over building entrances, and bricks still jut out in some places by as much as two inches.
Repairs have been made over the years, but more work is needed, Thacker said.
“This becomes a lot more than just maintenance,” he said.
The building’s brick exterior will be removed and replaced with a stucco-like material called EIFS. Concrete slabs will be cut out in three classrooms and replaced after harder soil is installed underneath.
The roof will be replaced, and a cafeteria wall and slab in a dry storage room will also be removed and replaced.
“You can feel it buckle and roll as you walk across it,” Thacker said.
Moisture and heating and cooling cycles have caused brick walls to bulge and crack.
The school system plans to use $500,000 of its own money for the repairs and will ask the Oak Ridge City Council for a $500,000 contribution on Monday.
Thacker said the school system has already paid for geotechnical surveys and architectural fees.
He said Woodland has four sections built between 1948 and 1989. The soil underneath the building can contract quite a bit — it’s settled as much as three inches — depending upon the moisture.
The repair work is scheduled to start June 4 and should be substantially complete by Aug. 1, Thacker said.
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