by SUSAN MANN
A Russian dairy farmer is seeking a $1.5 million settlement after his two Cover-All buildings collapsed due to heavy snow loads but the company that now owns some of the former pre-engineered building manufacturer’s assets says its not liable.
Norseman Group Ltd. bought some of the assets of Cover-All Building Systems, including the buildings and the company name. The deal was finalized in June. But “they’re two different companies,” says Mark Mascotto, Norseman vice president of marketing.
“We don’t want people to confuse Cover-All with Norseman,” he adds.
Norseman paid $14 million for the Cover-All assets, Mascotto says. A total of 10 companies were bidding for the assets.
But Norseman can’t take on the liabilities of the former Cover-All company, he explains. “It was a different company. They weren’t our designs. We didn’t manufacture those products,” he says.
It would be like asking car manufacturer General Motors to take on Chrysler’s problems, he explains. “They just can’t.”
Former Cover-All dealer Aleks Jatsoun of Russia told Better Farming by e-mail that one Cover-All Titan-model building owned by Poliekt Podgornov collapsed March 12, 2009, while the other failure happened on Jan. 30, 2010. They were located in Yaroslavl Region, located 250 kilometres northeast of Moscow in the heart of central Russia.
There weren’t any people or cows in the buildings, which were 110 feet by 440 feet, at the time of either collapse. Podgornov is one of Russia’s top 10 dairy farmers. He owns more than 4,000 cows and produces 60,000 to 70,000 kilograms of milk daily. He was planning to use the buildings for a dairy farm academy, a training centre for young people interested in dairy farming, Jatsoun explains.
Podgornov requested the metal used in the buildings be tested and samples were sent to a Russian certified lab in Yaroslavl. Jatsoun claims test results showed the metal was weaker than what was declared by Cover-All in its documents. Metal dimensions and components were also different. Some pipes were smaller than those shown in Cover-All’s drawings and documents.
A Cover-All representative also collected samples from the farm that were sent to the Imperial College Laboratory in the United Kingdom on March 19. Jatsoun says neither he nor Podgornov received the results of those tests.
To obtain compensation, Podgornov filed a claim with Jatsoun’s company, EuroAgro. EuroAgro forwarded the claim to Cover-All’s court-appointed receiver, PricewaterhouseCoopers Inc. Cover-All went into receivership earlier this spring.
Jatsoun says his sales plummeted after the two collapses “as Mr.Podgornov’s farms are famous and everybody watched what happened there.” He says EuroAgro remains in operation “in order to help our customer, Mr. Podgornov.”
He says neither his company nor Podgornov received the safety notices issued by Cover-All earlier this year warning about the Titans’ susceptibility to collapse from heavy snow or strong winds.
Once the receiver told him that Norseman had acquired Cover-All’s assets Jatsoun approached that new owner with the claim. He says he has not received a response.
Mascotto says Norseman plans to try providing support to customers and dealers “in terms of possible fixes for their buildings because we have the best access to the information now than anybody else.”
One of the reasons Cover-All went into receivership was because “they had several design issues with some of their buildings that created quite a liability or risk for the company and they decided it was too much for them to handle,” he explains.
Cover-All was facing a number of legal challenges in different parts of the world, including the United States where a practice facility owned by the Dallas Cowboys football team collapsed injuring several people.
Mascotto says Norseman isn’t responsible for the lawsuits launched against Cover-All “because we didn’t buy the company. We just bought some of the assets, including the manufacturing plant.”
Norseman plans to build its own fabric covered buildings. It will look at some of the Cover-All designs “and redesign them, if possible, to be better buildings,” Mascotto says. But the company won’t be selling the same pre-engineered buildings as Cover-All.
Norseman is doing a ground-up redesign of some of the Cover-All models. Some models will be discontinued, including the majority of the Titan line. “We are looking at one part of that line but it’s going through a ground-up redesign to see if it’s reasonable to start producing a version of it again,” he says.
The company also plans to have dealers in Ontario sell its product line. “A number of the previous Cover-All dealers will be working with us in the Ontario market,” Mascotto says. “We’re very aggressively going back into that market.”
In the meantime, Jatsoun says his company may consider pursuing the claim with Cover-All’s former owner: U.S.-based Audax Group. BF
Comments
SAFETY WARNINGS FOR CONTINUED USE and PURCHASE OF Cover-All(CAB
Submitted by an online visitor on September 23, 2010 - 1:48pm.
The former Cover-All Building Systems Inc. Authorized Dealer SAFETY WARNINGS FOR CONTINUED USE and PURCHASE OF Cover-All(CABS, Saskatoon or Summit Structures ) produced buildings
Relying on the recent events and 5-year cooperation experience with Cover-All company, being a co-owner of the group of companies, authorized dealer of Cover-All Building Systems, I would like to make a statement addressed to the owners of ‘Тitan’ buildings, former dealers of Cover-All Building Systems(Canada) company and to media.
Background:
The group of companies “ЕuroАgro” began its work as an authorized dealer in 2005. The first sales were effectuated by us in 2006, and according to the year results we were nominated as ‘Dealer of the Year’ in Europe at the European Dealer’s Conference.
Pursuant to the sales results for 2007 at the 1st International Dealer’s Conference, which was held in March 2008 our company was nominated as a ‘Dealer of the Year International’ и ‘Project of the Year’. We arranged twice our customers study visits to Canada, paid by us, it’s in order to demonstrate new philosophy of dairy barn construction.
Facts:
Beginning from March 2009 the dispute concerning the collapse of one of the ‘Titans’ delivered by us with the subsequent collapse of another one building on the same construction site in January 2010.
During the examination of the first building’s collapse the representatives of Cover-All insisted that the main reason of the collapse can be explained by defects made in the process of the building and assembly work (the assembly has been conducted by specialized independent company). Therefore, the other versions of this collapse have not been considered. The manufacturer of the constructions, Cover-All company, has originally imposed the responsibility for the accident on the dealer and project organization (Appendix ___), and it was only after the protest against the correctness of the facts described in the letter that the manufacturer has chosen the assembly as a main version of the collapse (Appendix___). The Dealer and project group’s (the latter took part in the building’s projecting) requirement to elaborate the building’s reinforcement has been ignored by Cover-All. This requirement was expressed at the meeting with Mr. Dexter, Dealer’s Network Development Director, in Moscow and has been written personally by him in July 2009.
However, in spite of the measures taken to increase the control over the quality of the assembly work of Cowhouse # № 2, the indicated building has also collapsed after Cover-All gave the respective warranty according to the established form (Appendix _№_). So the measurements of the profile sections used by Cover-All in its delivered metal constructions have been performed, and the metal patterns of the damaged constructions have been checked in the independent certified laboratory as to their conformity to the parameters indicated by their manufacturer in the technical documentation. As a result, the differences both in the geometric dimensions of the sections of some metal profiles and the essential mismatch of the physical and mechanic characteristics have been established (in particular, strength characteristics (30-40% less), in delivered steel marks comparing with those indicated in the documents (see Appendix 3).
Beginning from 02. 02. 2010 the owner of 2 collapsed buildings tried to hold an active dialogue with the top management of Cover-All Building Systems, first of all, with President of Cover-All Building Systems Mr. Stobbe to settle the indemnification matter in an amicable way. The owner of the collapsed buildings has presented all the materials collected by Collapse Reason Examination Commission, including those concerning the chemical analysis of the applied steel’s composition.
The only reaction of Mr. Stobbe to the collapse happened in 2010 has been his letter sent by E-mail, which confirmed his reception of the address of the Owner of the collapsed buildings.
Having known that the owner of Cover-All Building Systems is an Audax investment group, the Owner of the buildings has sent the letters addressed to Mr. Geoffrey S. Rehnert and Mr. Marc B. Wolpow appealing them to interfere in the matter’s solution process. This address has not been responded until 16. 06. 2010 when Audax made a declaration that they were not responsible for the actions or inaction of the Cover-All staff members.
You can read the following on the website of Cover-All company:
«Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, Canada, Friday, March 19, 2010 – Cover-All Building Systems Inc. today announced it has issued a safety warning to customers of the Titan Building product lines based on the findings of a review of previously sold buildings». – Such an announcement, as well as the sworn declaration of Mr. Stobbe, President of Cover-All Building Systems Inc., in the court of the Province of Альберта does not correspond to the facts. See – attachment “Cover-All Building Systems Issues Safety Notice to Customers for the Titan Building Product Lines”
The Cover-All Building Systems Inc. has never warned us, our company or any of our staff members on the possible danger of its Titan buildings maintenance. Thus, the sworn declarations of the President of Cover-All Buildings Systems on the alleged informing of the dealers and customers by sending the appropriate information are false. The Cover-All Buildings Systems limited itself to the placement of the information on its website and has not done anything to notify timely its dealers and the owners of the buildings. Taking the above into consideration, one can suppose that the top management of Cover-All company in the person of its President Mr. N. Stobbe, technical Vice-President Mr. М. H. Аntonini, perhaps, other Company’s staff members as well, during the investigation of the indicated cowhouses’ collapse has already known the true reasons of this accident and deliberately misled us trying to avoid their responsibility. Thereby the life and health of the people being inside the buildings and/or nearby were in real danger; fortunately, nobody suffered.
Our company, as one of the dealers of Cover-All company, counted that the manufacturer of the production sold by us should take some measures to correct the situation after the first Warning placed on its website.
The manufacturer declared its intentions to effectuate the building’s strength control calculations, concentrate the efforts of its design group thereon and help the dealers and owners of the ‘Titan’ buildings in reinforcement of the latter. “As a building manufacturer, safety is our number one priority. Based on what we know now, we have advised our customer and dealers to follow certain safety steps relative to Titan buildings,” said Nathan Stobbe, President and CEO of Cover-All Building Systems.
What have we, dealers and buyers of the Cover-All’s buildings, got finally?
In his second warning of 23. 04. 2010 the Manufacturer (the only structure who has information on the construction of the buildings, used materials and so called ‘philosophy’ of this construction) suggests that he cannot continue financing the calculations. Thereby the Manufacturer leaves us all (dealers and owners of the buildings) alone with the problem; taking into account that the dealers do not specialize in the design of the building’s construction: they deal with sales and assembly. Therefore, their do not possess much capacity to make the skillful calculations of the real strength of the exploited buildings.
What assistance/support has been rendered by Audax investment group, owner of Cover-All Building Systems Inc., in the situation of ‘Тitan’ buildings dangerous maintenance?
No assistance, judging by its declaration on the absence of this company’s involvement and responsibility for the described problem.
Hereby I would like to summarize the aforesaid:
• Collapse list published by North American mass media should be complemented by 2 collapsed ‘Титан’ buildings in Russia (in March 2009 and January 2010).
• The reason of the said collapse, in commission’s opinion (this commission consisted of the representatives of the Customer, project organization, assembly organization and authorized dealer of Cover-All Buildings Systems), was a mismatch of the declared quality of the delivered buildings (first of all, the metal’s quality ). The respective Statement has been drawn up on the ground of the examination by members of the commission of the chemical analysis results concerning the metal constructions samples fulfilled by certified laboratory of 17th of February 2010 and been forwarded to Cover-All Buildings Systems
• The manufacturer of the buildings, Cover-All Buildings Systems, was granted an opportunity to inspect the place of the said collapse and take samples for the control analysis of the metal’s chemical and strength properties. The samples was taken by representative of Cover-All Buildings Systems Mr. Keith Dexter personally and forwarded to the laboratory Imperial College (UK) on 19. 03. 2010.
• The results of the testing mentioned in the previous paragraph have not been notified hitherto to the owner of the buildings despite of the numerous reminders. What do the managers of Cover-All Buildings Systems conceal? If the metal’s quality conforms with that declared by Manufacturer, it makes no sense to conceal such an information.
• The probable information held by management of Cover-All Buildings Systems, which confirms the mismatch of the used metal’s quality and concealment of the same, can threaten the life of the people working in these buildings. The announcement «Safety warning to customers» published in March and April propose every building’s owner to attract the engineers-calculators for the check of the building’s strength and its conformity with local loads, but the calculations shall be grounded on the metal’s characteristics declared by manufacturer, Cover-All Buildings Systems, Saskatoon.
• As a former dealer of Cover-All Buildings Systems, Canada, I am worried by absence of any volition on the part of the management of Cover-All Buildings Systems to present the reliable information to the owners of the buildings whose amount exceeds 35,000 in different countries according to mass media information.
We are ready to grant the exhaustive information collected by us and commission during the examination of 2 collapsed buildings for the interested parties. The present statement shall not be directed anyhow against the efforts of the Norseman company to resume the production and create the new workplaces for the plant’s staff dismissed in March 2010 by Cover-All Building Systems top management.
Sincerely Yours,
Аleks Jatsoun
Contact E-mail address: Cover-Rus@inbox.ru
Citation: "Mascotto says Norseman plans to try providing support to customers and dealers “in terms of possible fixes for their buildings because we have the best access to the information now than anybody else.”
At present the Head Quorter of Norseman Structures does hold in its hand the results of samples analysis. The samples were taken by representative of Cover-All Buildings Systems Mr. Keith Dexter personally and forwarded to the laboratory Imperial College (UK) on 19. 03. 2010.
The results of the testing mentioned in the previous paragraph have not been notified hitherto to the owner of the buildings despite of the numerous reminders.
Even HQ of Norseman Structures does refuse to tender documents, connected to testing of samples without permission from former top-management of CAB. I wonder what exact was mentioned by new owner, saying "...try providing support to customers and dealers “in terms of possible fixes for their buildings because we have the best access to the information now than anybody else.”???
Post new comment