Part of the Kennedy Center grand foyer ceiling collapsed during Sept. 4 storms, no injuries

The collapse. A section of ceiling fell in the Kennedy Center's grand foyer on Friday evening (Sept. 4), during heavy rain in Washington. The foyer is the long hallway linking the Opera House, Concert Hall and Eisenhower Theater. Debris covered the floor and left a large hole overhead. Nobody was hurt. The closures. No performance has been publicly canceled or moved. The main building closed for the evening, and the foyer stayed shut for the weekend. The blame. The center blamed the collapse not on the storm but on "decades of neglect and deferred maintenance by the previous leadership." Its vice president of public relations, Roma Daravi, posted: " the place is falling apart and @realDonaldTrump wants to fix it." (TS: No independent engineer has assessed this ceiling. The only causal account comes from the center itself, which is the side asking for the closure.) Where it stands. The board's repair plan requires closing the building for two years, and would cost $250 million — just under the $257 million Congress has already set aside for the work. U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper blocked that closure on May 29. A separate request to put revised language honoring Trump on the facade is still pending before him.

What engineers flagged before the Sept. 4 collapse:

• Sections of the overhanging terrace roof weigh 22,000 pounds each and are called collapse risks
• Electrical systems date to the 1990s; chillers and boilers are more than 30 years old