Student bar The Foundry reopens

Canterbury University's student bar has reopened.

The Foundry has been shut since mid-July after its floor collapsed during a concert.

The $2.5 million venue had been open only since April after the original bar was damaged in the February 2011 earthquake.

An independent investigation commissioned by the university attributed the cause of the floor collapse to "human error".

The university said the investigation found the commercial structural engineers who helped to design the events centre "did not calculate a dynamic load for the floor".

This led to the floor giving way under a dancing crowd of 900 people, despite the building's capacity being 1400.

The floor had since been strengthened, and the bar reopened yesterday.

Fourth-year psychology master's student Pip Newton was at The Foundry the night the floor collapsed. Rowdy concertgoers had been caught unaware as hip-hop artist Savage stopped mid-performance and "the crowd was still going crazy".

"At first everybody was still raging until it filtered through the crowd that the floor broke, but everybody was pretty sweet and just left. We all just thought there was an earthquake," she said.

"It's been pretty boring without The Foundry. The students finally had a place again and then it was gone."

by Ashleigh Stewart c/o thepress.co.nz