TIRANA, July 26 – The Construction Institute made the technical assessment of the National Library building, as it was flooded by heavy rainfall last month and burned, about a year ago. According to the report, last month’s floods happened due to the building’s old age.
Similarly, the report highlighted the fire protection system needs deep reconstruction. Experts pointed out the ground’s basement and sidewalls lack hydrolysis.
This was not taken into consideration during the building’s construction, as there was no proper hydrologic study of the area at the time.
The CI’s report quotes old age, frequent damages and lack of proper measures to protect the building as the main reasons behind the building’s basement floods.
Last month, the water came up at the building’s ground floor, for which the expertise blamed the lack of a hydrologic study.
According to the experts, the library’s foundation has suffered damages that have not been able to protect it from underwater waters.
However, experts excluded a blocked sewage system as a possible reason behind the floods.
In this context, the experts advised the urgent removal of important files from the ground floor, the conduction of the necessary hydrolysis and the eventual restoration of the damages.
It was also made known that a 2012 reconstruction did not meet the necessary requirements to protect the building, while the space available for the growing number of material has also been rendered inappropriate for over 20 years.
Lastly, according to the expertise, the walls of the building, especially on the basement floors, are degraded due to humidity and, on some surfaces, they also appear cracked.
